The Way It Is
by Lamia Astaroth
Summary: [Ch. 6 Up] It starts out small. Nothing more than a cold. But then it spreads. And your whole life changes. Read and Review!
1. Chapter One

Disclaimer-I own nothing. The show belongs to its creators.

Author's Note-This is the first "South Park" fan fiction that I've ever written. Since this is the first "South Park" story that I've written, I apologize for anything that is out of character.

This story takes place somewhere in season eight, and the boys are in fourth grade. I got the main idea for this story after my midterms last week. I'm not sure if this story is going to be a slash or just a friendship piece; I'll have to see how it goes. Please read and review; no flames, but constructive criticism is always appreciated!

* * *

The Way It Is

By: Lamia Astaroth

* * *

Advice is what we ask  
for when we already  
know the answer but  
wish we didn't.  
–Erica Jong

As I see it every day  
you do one of two things:  
build health or produce  
disease in yourself.  
-Adelle Davis

Nothing has any power  
over me other than that  
which I give through my  
conscious thoughts.  
–Anthony Robbins

Broken glass inside my head  
Bleeding down these thoughts of  
Anguish...mass confusion  
–Green Day "Panic Song"

**

* * *

**

CHAPTER ONE

"Kyle, get up! You're going to be late for school!" Kyle Broflovski groaned, but pushed down the covers and climbed out of his bed. He rubbed the sleep from his eyes and waited for everything to clear. That's when he noticed...

His head hurt. Actually, correction; it hurt like _hell_, but Kyle was able to shrug it off. He had awoken with a headache for over a week now. By now, he knew that the only real thing to do was to pop an Advil and wait until the pain went away. They usually did, after all, so it was no big deal.

Kyle pulled on his orange jacket and green pants, and then pulled his green hat on over his curly red hair, hiding it all from view. Shuffling into his parents' bathroom, Kyle opened up the medicine cabinet and pulled out the aspirin. He struggled for a moment trying to untwist the top.

"Goddamn child lock," he murmured under his breath. Finally, the top untwisted and he pulled it off of the container. He dropped one pill into his hand and swallowed it, followed by a quick swig of water.

"Kyle, breakfast!" Sheila Broflovski shouted to her son, somewhat impatiently. Kyle moaned, slinking down to the kitchen and sitting at the kitchen table, where a plate of fresh waffles was sitting. He picked up his fork and started to eat.

Within two bites, he had to stop; he felt both full and slightly nauseated. "Thanks for breakfast, Mom. I've got to go. The bus is going to be here any minute."

Sheila frowned, looking at her son's plate. "Kyle, is that all you're going to eat?" she asked, still staring at the mostly-uneaten waffle.

"Yeah, so?" Kyle asked, shrugging. "I'm just not hungry right now. I'll be fine until lunch, don't worry." He turned and began to walk toward the front door when his mother's voice stopped him in his tracks:

"This isn't healthy, Kyle. You're going to be starving all through school and--"

"Mom, seriously, it's no big deal," Kyle interrupted, holding up his hands. "But if I somehow _do_ get hungry between now and lunch, I'll be sure to steal something from one of the kindergartners. They usually have good stuff." He then turned and walked out the front door, leaving his mother shaking her head after him.

As he trudged down the steps from his house and walked towards the bus stop, Kyle rubbed at the sore spot on his forehead, hoping that it would go away before school began. _Maybe I should've told Mom about it,_ he thought. _Maybe she's got something that'll work better on headaches than this Advil shit._

But he knew that not telling his mother was probably the correct choice. The last thing he needed was someone whining at him about _"you're sick because you didn't eat this morning" _or _"get your ass to school. What are you trying to avoid?"_ or the infamous _"you only _think_ you're sick; it's all in your head."_

It was all pure bullshit, and they knew it. But maybe they had a point; maybe it all _was_ in his head. _But I've got no reason to make myself sick_, Kyle thought. _Nothing different is happening in school. Nothing's changed…maybe--_

"Hey Kyle," a voice greeted, breaking through Kyle's thoughts and sending him back into reality.

"Hey Stan," he replied. Wow, was he at the bus stop already? He had been so immersed in his thoughts that he had not even realized that he had gotten there.

"What's up, dude?" Stan asked as Kyle walked up to him and stood beside him. "You don't look so good."

Kyle groaned. "I've got a headache. Had it ever since I woke up," he replied, rubbing at his forehead as though to prove it.

"Again?" Stan shook his head and rolled his eyes. "Dude, you've had one every day this week. When the hell are you going to tell your mom about it?"

"Umm…never," Kyle retorted. "I don't need her bitching to me about how I'm just trying to miss school and then telling me to take an aspirin. So I'll just avoid the bitching all together by taking the aspirin and _never_ telling my mom about it. Okay?"

Stan held up his hands in retreat. "Whatever Kyle. It's your life." He paused, kicking at the snow with his shoe. "What is it with you and getting sick, anyway?" he asked after a moment's silence. "It seems like you get sick more than anyone else in our class."

"Well, that's because God is making him pay for everything that the Jews did to Jesus," Cartman interrupted, speaking for the first time since Kyle had arrived. "It's God's revenge to make him sick and suffer more than us good Christians--"

"Fuck off, Cartman!" Kyle snapped, looking in heated anger at the larger boy standing near him. "Besides," he continued, turning back to Stan, "the aspirin have been working, so what else can I do? A headache's just a headache."

_"Then why the fuck do you complain about them every day?" _Kenny mumbled, looking over at Kyle in question.

"Because they suck, Kenny, that's why," Kyle replied. He frowned. This whole "headache" thing was becoming really annoying and, quite frankly, he wanted to just drop the whole issue right then and there, but his other friends did not seem to be interested in changing the subject:

"Well, if they suck so much, then just tell your mom and she'll do something to, you know, make them go away," Stan said.

"Can we just stop talking about it? It's no big deal, all right? They usually go away by lunch time, anyway, so what difference does it make?" Kyle demanded.

Stan and Kenny shrugged, but did not make another comment about it. Cartman simply rolled his eyes and looked down the road to see if the bus was nearly there. Kyle crossed his arms tightly over his chest, slightly amazed that his friends had actually listened to his request.

After a moment of an unspoken silence, Cartman decided to break it with an afterthought: "--besides, even if Kyle _wanted_ to tell his mom about it, she's way too much of a bitch to actually _do_ something--"

"I swear to God, Cartman, if you say one more fucking word--"

"--oh, you can swear to God all you want, Kyle, but He's never going to listen to a stupid Jew," Cartman replied, sounding as calm as ever.

Kyle began to charge toward Cartman, his hands clenched into tight fists, but Stan caught his best friend by the shoulders, stopping him. "Just forget it, Kyle. Besides, here comes the bus." Stan released Kyle's shoulders as the bus rolled to a stop a few feet from where the four boys stood.

The door to the bus opened, revealing the always-pissed-off face of Ms. Crabtree. She frowned at them and yelled, "Well, if you're gonna get on the bus, _get on_!"

The four boys obeyed, climbed onto the bus and taking their seats; Stand and Kyle on one bench, Cartman and Kenny on the bench directly behind them.

Kyle, who was sitting nearest the window, leaned his forehead against the cold glass, hoping to lessen the pain that was erupting throughout his skull.

_It'll go away, _he told himself, closing his eyes. _Just don't think about it. It's like hiccups; they'll only go away if you forget about them._

However, he knew that "forgetting about it" was going to be damn near impossible. It was not, after all, something that was exactly easy to just ignore.

Kyle opened his eyes when he felt something poking him in the ribs. "Kyle, dude," Stan whispered to him, "don't fall asleep. Ms. Crabtree'll get pissed."

"I wasn't sleeping," Kyle murmured in return. Truth be told, he would have loved to go back to sleep. Just the night before, he had had one of those dreams that were so vivid that you feel like it is actually happening, and then, when you wake up, it feels like you haven't slept at all. God, he hated those types of dreams; they really wiped him out.

"Well, don't even look like you're sleeping; you know what a bitch she can be," Stan remarked, and Kyle nodded, sitting up straight.

Cartman mumbled something under his breath, which sounded suspiciously like, "Like your mom," and Kenny chuckled. Kyle turned his head and gave Cartman an angry glare, to which Cartman replied with an eerily sweet grin, feigning innocence.

Kyle rolled his eyes and turned back around in his seat. "Stupid fatass," he mumbled to himself, slouching back down and resting his forehead against the window once again.

Stan elbowed Kyle in the side, causing Kyle to emit a groan in both shock and pain. "Dude, seriously…" Stan looked through the window to see where they were and added, "We're at school, anyway."

"Oh, great, fine," Kyle replied, sarcastically. "Thanks for letting me know."

The bus rolled to a stop, lurching slightly as it did so. Stan and Kyle stood up from their seats and followed the line of students as they exited the bus, Cartman and Kenny following closely behind them.

Once they were outside the bus, staring at the entrance to the school, Kyle felt his head beginning to clear. _Thank God,_ he thought, smiling slightly.

"Why the hell are you smiling, Jew?" Cartman asked, interrupting Kyle's thoughts. "And if you say that you're happy that you're at school, I'm seriously gonna kick your ass."

Kyle groaned, his smile fading. "Yeah, like you could, fatass," he retorted. "Remember, I hit you once (not even that hard, really), and you started crying--"

"Okay, I totally did not cry. I…just…"

_"--cried? Yeah, I remember that. It was fucking pathetic," _Kenny piped in, smirking beneath his hood.

"Hey!…shut up, you guys!" Cartman shouted, crossing his arms.

Kyle smiled to himself, walking toward the school's front doors. He pushed them open and walked around the small groupings of kids that had collected in the hallway. "Dude, wait up!" he heard Stan call from behind him.

Kyle stopped in his tracks, rather abruptly, and a kid who had been walking directly behind him smacking into Kyle's back, nearly knocking him and the kid over as a result. "Oh, sorry Kyle," the kid said, smiling apologetically.

"That's all right, Butters," Kyle replied, then walked around the small blond boy when he saw that his three friends had already entered the classroom.

He entered the classroom and sat down at his usual desk. Immediately, he propped his elbows on the desk and rested his head in his hands. It seemed that when Butters had run into him, it had somehow caused his headache to return.

"Dammit," he mumbled to himself, half-closing his eyes. _Just eight more hours until school's over,_ he reminded himself in a desperate search to find something that would maybe help his headache to go away (if the headache was a result of stress, that was).

Kyle barely noticed when Mr. Garrison entered the room. "Okay, children," he stated upon entering the room, "sit down now." As the remainder of the class sat down at their desks, Kyle lay his head down, silently praying that the day would be over quickly.

"Now for roll--" Mr. Garrison continued, and Kyle sighed, telling himself not to think about how he felt, but for God's sake, how else was he supposed to think about?

"--Broflovski?" Kyle lifted his head at the sound of his name and answered with a slightly strangled "Yeah." Mr. Garrison put down a check next to Kyle's name in the attendance book and moved along to the next name.

_God, _Kyle thought_, I hope the rest of the day goes by faster than this…_

Kyle was amazed to find that, during his lunch period, the day had done by faster than he thought it was going to. Although it was always easy to say that after the day was practically over. He sat down at a lunch table and waited (not so) patiently for his friends to arrive.

As he waited, he looked down at the tray of food in front of him: macaroni and cheese and a carton of low-fat milk. Suddenly, he no longer felt hungry, but he knew that his mother would be pissed off if she knew that he had not eaten both breakfast _and_ lunch, so he forced himself to pick up the plastic fork from his tray.

Kyle picked at the noodles for a moment, then set the fork back down and began to scan the room for his friends. He saw Cartman first (_It would be kind of hard_ not_ to see him_, he thought with a snicker), followed by Stan and…

Kyle frowned when he saw that Stan was walking toward the table with his girlfriend, Wendy Testaburger. _Ever since those two got back together last week, he's been bringing her _everywhere._ I mean, I'm all for commitment, but come _on!_ Get some space!_

Kyle sighed to himself. _Okay, I don't really care if he brings her everywhere, but when he does…he never pays attention to me…whoa, that sounded really gay. But, I mean, he's my best friend. Sometimes I'd actually like to actually talk to him._

"Look at the crap they're feeding us," Cartman complained, dropping his tray down beside Kyle's and sitting down. "This is such bullshit; they've served this same Mac and Cheese three times this week. God, lazy assholes."

He took a bite of his macaroni and cheese, glancing over at Kyle's plate. "Hey, aren't you gonna eat that? I mean, you _did_ pay for that. Isn't it some kind of Jewish sin for you to waste money?"

Kyle opened his mouth to reply, then closed it. He did not feel up for getting into an argument with Cartman when he felt like crap. Instead, he shook his head. "No, I'm not gonna eat it," he replied. "You want it?"

"Hell yes!" Cartman reached over and grabbed the plate off of Kyle's tray. As he continued eating off his own plate of food, Kyle asked, "Dude, what happened to Stan? Didn't I see him walking behind you?"

"Uhh…" A confused look spread over Cartman's face as he struggled to remember what Kyle was talking about. "Oh! Right, right. He said he'd catch up. Something about him and Wendy getting a soda or something."

"Oh." Kyle cast his gaze down to the table. _Why am I not surprised?_

"Yeah, I'm telling you, he's really turned into Wendy's little bitch. And it should really be the other way around." Cartman took a quick swig of his milk before starting in on Kyle's plate.

"Uh huh," Kyle said, rolling his eyes. Sure, he had never had a girlfriend per se, but that did not mean that he did not know anything. He knew that friends did not ditch friends to hang out with their girlfriends. He knew that girlfriends did not take priority over friends. And he sure as hell knew that friends did not simply ignore their friends when their girlfriends are around. It was all part of the unwritten laws of friendship. It was all common sense stuff, anyway.

"Hey, where's Kenny?" Kyle asked suddenly, noticing the absence of their fourth friend.

"Umm, some kind of science accident," Cartman replied through a mouthful of food. "The ambulance took his body away about an hour ago. You know, if his family wasn't so goddamn poor, they could sue the school and get it shut down." Cartman grinned in delight at the thought. "Yeah, that'd be sweet."

Kyle sighed deeply, staring around the cafeteria. _Where the hell is he? It can't take this long to get a fucking soda._ He paused in his thoughts, momentarily disgusted with himself. _Oh my God, I sound like a stalker,_ he thought, shaking his head in embarrassment.

"Hey dudes," Stan greeted, sitting down in front of Kyle at the table.

"Hey," Kyle replied. "Where's your girlfriend?"

"She's coming," Stan replied with a grin. "I've gotta tell you, I'm so glad that she and I got back together last week. I mean, it's been so great and I'm not as nervous around her as I used to be, which is awesome, and…"

Kyle glanced at Cartman, who was eating what was left of Kyle's plate, obviously completely oblivious to the fact that Stan was still talking. _I hate being second, and I really hate being--_

His head was throbbing again, and he pressed his hands against his temple. _And it totally does not help that I've got this goddamn headache._

"…I don't think that I've ever been this happy--" Stan continued, the same foolish grin on his face.

"--Whoa," Cartman interrupted, setting down his plastic fork, "are you seriously still talking?"

Kyle resisted an urge to chuckle. Even though Cartman could annoy the living hell out of him, he knew how to shut Stan up when he went on one of his Wendy rants.

Stan frowned, but shrugged and began eating. "Hey Kyle," he began, swallowing, "why'd you let Cartman have your lunch? Do you really think that he needs it?"

"I wasn't hungry," Kyle replied, not mentioning the fact that even looking at food made him want to throw up.

"Have you eaten lunch at all this week?" Stan asked, eyeing his best friend suspiciously.

"Yeah. Remember, yesterday I had that sandwich…"

"Dude, you took two bites and said you were full," Stan reminded him, frowning through his bite of food.

"Whatever. I ate, didn't I?" Kyle snapped. He rubbed his forehead again, easing the pulse that was thumping through his head.

"If you think you're sick, Kyle, you should just tell your mom. Who cares if she bitches you out? Then later, when you get _really_ sick, you can be all, 'I told you so, but you didn't listen, so this is your fault.' You don't get a lot of chances to do that to your parents, so you should use every opportunity. It's fun."

"I guess…but I don't even know if I'm really sick or not. What if I'm just--"

"Hi Stan," Wendy greeting, cutting Kyle off mid-sentence.

"Hi Wendy. Here, sit." Wendy sat down beside Stan and the two of them began to cat amongst themselves.

Kyle moaned inwardly. "Why bother?" he murmured.

* * *

"I'm home, Mom!" Kyle called as he walked through the front door to his house. 

"Kyle!" Ike squealed, running toward his older brother happily.

"Hey Ike," Kyle said, walking past his brother.

"Watch TV?" Ike asked, watching as Kyle walked past him on his way to the kitchen.

"No TV today, Ike. I don't feel good."

"Kyle sick?" Ike asked.

"Yeah. Well...I mean...I don't know. Maybe. I'm going to ask Mom for some medicine," Kyle replied.

"Oh. 'Kay," Ike cooed, turning and scrambling back into the television room.

Kyle continued into the kitchen, where his mother was sitting. "Mom?" he asked, causing her to turn and look at him.

"Yes, booby?" she replied.

"I have a headache, can I have an aspirin? Please?" he added, out of second thought.

"Why?" Sheila Broflovski demanded, standing up from where she stood and facing her son. "Are you sick?" She pressed her hand against Kyle's forehead, checking for a fever. "Well, you're a little warm, but it's nothing serious."

"Yeah, okay, can I _please_ have an aspirin?"

"Well, all right, but you'd better not be getting sick. You don't need any sick days--"

"Okay, thanks Mom. I'll go get them." Kyle left the kitchen and dashed up the stairs to his parents' bathroom. He pulled out the Advil and popped out one pill. After taking the pill with a sip of water, Kyle found that his headache was already beginning to pass.

_Finally_, he thought, happily. He walked into his bedroom and plopped face-down on his bed. He silently reminded himself that he still had homework to do, that he should not fall asleep, but it was all forgotten in less than a second when Kyle slipped into a deep sleep. And as he slept, the headache returned.

_To Be Continued..._


	2. Chapter Two

Disclaimer-I own nothing. The show belongs to its creators.

Author's Note-Many thanks go out to all those who reviewed: "Spice of Life," "CAHLAY," "Janelle," Lauzaa, Out Of Tune, Faery Goddyss, E2K, Blue Eyed Angel2, Leela's Tears, Society's Cavity, and Red the Lupine Dragon.

I have also fixed all of the spelling/season issues in the previous chapter. Thanks to everyone who pointed them out. I have also decided that this story is going to be a friendship story, because, as someone pointed out, they _are_ only in fourth grade, so…yeah, it's going to be a friendship story. Just remember that after this chapter.

* * *

The Way It Is

By: Lamia Astaroth

* * *

It's no longer a question  
of staying healthy. It's  
a question of finding a  
sickness you like.  
–Jackie Mason

Somebody else betrays his  
best friend for a woman.  
If you can't find that…  
in life, then you, my friend,  
don't know crap about life.  
-Robert McKee: _Adaptation._

Don't know why you  
say you're doing fine.  
That's not what it looks like  
Something doesn't feel right.  
-Rival Schools "Undercovers On"

I don't want to be alone  
again. And you left me  
wondering, what the hell?  
What is wrong with me?  
-Seether "Sold Me"

* * *

CHAPTER TWO

Kyle's eyes opened and he stared into the darkness of his bedroom for a moment. "Whoa, why's it so dark?" he asked himself, sitting upright in his bed.

His question was answered when he looked over at his alarm clock. The red digital numbers read _5:12 am._ He frowned at the clock, confused. How could it be only five in the morning? Especially when he actually felt...awake?

That's when he remembered: he had fallen asleep right when he had gotten home from school the day before. _Well, there's nothing wrong with actually being awake for school,_ he thought...

That's when he remembered something else: he hadn't done his homework. His eyes opened wide and he scrambled out of his bed. He dashed toward the spot where his backpack had been casually tossed the day before, nearly falling to the floor when he tripped over himself.

"Shit, shit," he mumbled under his breath as he grabbed his backpack from off the floor. He reached into his backpack and as soon as his hand touched his books, he remembered one last thing: _Today is Saturday._

Kyle stood up from his crouching position and slumped back over to his bed. He sat down and rubbed his head. _What the hell is wrong with me? How could I forget that it's the weekend? __And, more importantly, how could I go to sleep so goddamn early on a Friday night?_

He lay down on his bed, staring up at the ceiling, which was nothing more than a black darkness, seeing as how the sun had yet to come up. His stomach growled at him in anger and he placed his hand over it, feeling the vibrations that specifically told him that he needed to eat. Well, that was obvious; the last meal he had eaten had been the day before's lunch. And after sleeping--what had it been?--fourteen hours, anyone would be hungry.

_Wow, fourteen hours_? he asked himself in quiet disbelief. _How did I manage to do that?_

He mentally slapped himself for even asking himself that. He knew perfectly well how he had managed to sleep so long. Unknown to anyone else, he had been having some eerie (_Ha, that's putting it lightly,_ he thought) dreams. He did not wish to call them "nightmares" because they did not have any of the effects that nightmares had--waking up in the middle of the night, screaming out in horror, etc., etc.

But there was certainly something unsettling about them. For one thing, he never felt rested when he awoke, and it all seemed so…horribly _real_. No matter how strange, how out-of-place something may have seemed in his dream, it really did feel like it had happened. And what he hated the most was that, when he awoke, he was able to remember _everything_ about the dream, be it right when he awoke, or even hours later. He _hated_ that. You weren't supposed to be able to memorize your dreams. That's why they were _dreams._ Being able to reenact a dream that you had a whole goddamn week before just doesn't seem _natural_.

And they were all somewhat similar, he had noticed. They had all taken place in school. _I wonder if I'm stressing about school,_ he wondered, then thought better of it. He was certainly _not_ worried about school. He was smart, and he knew it. He had been doing fine in school so far; why stress about it then, months after school had started?

Kyle shook his head in the darkness. _It's not school_, he decided. _But then what the fuck _is it? The whole situation was incredibly draining and, as rested as he was, he was beginning to feel tired. "Well, it's only--" He snagged a quick glance at his clock. "--5:24 am on Saturday. It's not like I don't have plenty of time to sleep."

He closed his eyes and silently prayed for sleep to come. And after a moment, it did.

…Falling…

……Falling……

………Falling………

****

GROUND!!!!!!

Kyle awoke with a start, his heart feeling as though it was trying to spring out of his chest. He caught his breath and tried to calm himself. "Just a…a dream," he whispered in between breaths. "God, that sucked," he added.

He glanced quickly at the clock: 5:26 am. "No fucking way," he said. Two minutes? Only _two minutes_ had passed since he had fallen asleep? But it had felt like an hour at the very least. And after the near heart attack he had just experienced, he thought he deserved it to be a few hours later.

_Well, there's nothing I can do about it_, he thought, and knew it was true. There was nothing that he could do about it, so why dwell in Hell? His stomach growled again. "I'm hungry," he said, to no one, and knew that he could do something about that.

He stood up from his bed, and instantly felt as though his head was too heavy for his body. He swayed backwards and fell back on the bed in a sitting position. "Head rush," he mumbled in annoyance, standing up again.

Kyle walked out of his room and trudged down the stairs to the kitchen. He noticed that the stairs seemed to creak ten times as loud when it was nighttime. And, of course, when he was sneaking around. He entered the kitchen and took out a box of cereal. As he sat down at the breakfast table, he heard something creak just outside the kitchen.

He froze, waiting for either one of his parents to appear and question him about _"Oh, why are you up so early? Don't you know it's the weekend? What's wrong? Is there something wrong with you? Are you sick? You'd better not be sick. You're doing it to yourself…" _and then he'd be back to where he was yesterday. Pestering, pestering, pestering…_God, can't parents just leave us _alone?he asked himself, knowing that he would never get a reasonable answer to that question.

Instead of his parents, however, he was greeted by the confused (but strangely happy) face of his baby brother. "Kyle?" Ike asked, rubbing the sleep from his eye with a tiny, balled fist.

"Shh, shh," Kyle said, pressing his index finger to his lips in the universal gesture of _Be Quiet_.

Obviously, however, the "universal gesture" did not pertain to Canada, because Ike grinned and yelled, "Okaaaay!"

Kyle groaned. "Aww, Ike, why'd you--"

"Kyle? Ike?" Kyle looked at the doorway of the kitchen and saw his father standing there, looking both tired and pissed off. "What are you two boys doing up? Or should I just ask why Ike is up? I know why you're up, Kyle. You've been asleep since four o'clock yesterday afternoon."

"Yeah, uhh," Kyle began, rubbing at the back of his head. It hurt again--his whole head, not just the back of it--and had been ever since he had gotten out of bed. _Maybe it's…eating that's stressing me out,_ Kyle had thought on the way down to the kitchen. _Yeah, right. _"I was tired," he finished, hoping his father wouldn't try and squeeze more information out of him.

"I see," Mr. Broflovski replied, nodding knowingly. "Your mother says that you got home, asked for an Advil and then crashed."

Kyle nodded in reply. "Yeah, that's pretty much what happened. Just had a headache. It's gone now," he replied. He hated lying about something so stupid, but he was getting annoyed by all of the questioning. Okay, so there hadn't been more than one question, but the point was…

"And you decided that waking Ike and myself up was necessary, because--"

"Hey, I didn't _mean_ to wake him--or you--up. All I wanted was some cereal. I'm really hungry." He paused and, noticing his father's raised eyebrow, added, "What?"

"Well, I was wondering if you'd _ever_ be hungry again. You haven't been eating much, son. Your mother and I were getting worried…"_ Oh boy, _Kyle thought. _Guilt trip._ "…especially since you were getting headaches--"

"Hey!" Kyle snapped, cutting his father off mid-sentence. "It wasn't 'headaches,' it was 'headache'--" _Uh oh, Broflovski, another lie, _he warned himself, "--and I'm sorry that I haven't been eating enough for you, but _God_, why are you tormenting me about it? I'll eat when I'm hungry, and I won't when I'm not! Okay?!"

Kyle cringed as soon as he heard the words leave his mouth. As he saw his father's brow crease he knew that he was in for a hell of a speech. "Kyle Broflovski, you watch your mouth. I don't know what's been going on in school or with your friends, but you've really had a mouth on you lately."

Kyle looked down at the tabletop. He would admit (only to himself, of course) that he had been rather irritable the past week or so, but, for some reason, everything was pissing him off: his parents, Ike, his friends, Stan…oh, _especially_ Stan, and his precious Wendy. That annoying bitch had somehow been able to steal his best friend away from him and make Stan forget all about him.

Friendship's great, isn't it? Until some pretty whore comes along and changes that "friendship" into nothing. That term BFF should change to BFFUIFSB--"Best Friends Forever Until I Find Someone Better." Oh, and it even rhymes, how perfect!

_Wow, _Kyle thought, in astonishment_. When did I become such a dick? _He answered himself right away: _Ever since Stan and Wendy got back together. Huh, I wonder if that's why I'm so stressed out._

It seemed logical, he did not think that that was the reason. He had had a headache ever since he had awoken, and he had not even thought about either Stan or Wendy until a few seconds ago.

He looked up at his father, remembered his earlier outburst and said, "Sorry Dad. I don't know what's wrong..." Finally, a truth comes out. "...I'm just really easily annoyed for some reason. I think it's just...school." _Lie. God, can't I even go two words without lying anymore?_

Mr. Broflovski's brow uncreased and he smiled softly at his son. "Well, you'll work through it," he said. "You're a smart boy."

Kyle smiled at his father, but thought, _If I'm so smart, than why am I freaking out so much lately?_ As his father took Ike back upstairs, Kyle began to eat his breakfast. A number of bites in, he paused, feeling something churning in his stomach. He placed the spoon back on the table and waited to see if the strange, indescribable feeling would go away.

The feeling, however, seemed to worsen over that short period of time, turning into the feeling of nausea. Kyle hopped up from the table, hoping that the nausea was all in his mind. _You're doing it to yourself,_ his mind whispered to him. _You're only doing this to yourself. It's all in your mind._

"This is all…in my mind," Kyle muttered to himself, pressing his hand to his abdomen. "It's all in my mi--" He was unable to finish his sentence; the nausea overtook him and he dashed to the nearby-sitting wastebasket. As he emptied what little food he had had in his stomach, he began to cough, grimacing at the foul taste that had imbedded itself in his mouth.

He stumbled, slightly dazed, over to the sink and twisted the knob, sipping at the stream of water that began to flow from the faucet. "…nasty," he gasped, after he had rid himself of the taste. "So freakin' nasty."

He turned off the water and walked back to the wastebasket. He glanced around the empty downstairs, then gently plucked the lining out from the wastebasket. He walked outside with it and tossed it into one of the plastic trashcans that were waiting for the garbage truck to arrive.

Kyle reentered his house and sat back down at the breakfast table. Looking down at the barely eaten bowl of cereal in front of him, he felt the nausea returning. He pushed the bowl away, clutching at his stomach. "Oh God, no more," he murmured, standing up.

He trudged into the living room and sat down in front of the television. "Well, since I'm up, a little bit of TV can't hurt. Especially not after _that_." He turned on the television and began flipping channels. He found, to his dismay, that the only shows that were on were paid programming--people selling crap that no one really needs, but they act so goddamn _happy_ about it that people actually call up and buy whatever it may be.

He turned off the TV and sat in the stillness of the room for a moment. "This blows," he muttered to himself after a matter of seconds. He climbed off of the couch and walked back upstairs, frowning in irritation each time a stair creaked.

As soon as he entered his bedroom, he collapsed on his bed. He crawled under the covers, sighing deeply. _I can't believe I actually puked_, he thought, shaking his head at the memory. _It's unbelievable. I'm not really sick…it's stress or jealousy or something… _

_Wait, _he thought, suddenly_, it's not jealousy. I'm not jealous of Stan and Wendy…that's just gay. I just want my best friend to be my best friend again. Like it used to be. I don't want to be who he hangs out with just because his girlfriend's not around._

He paused, thinking it over again. _Well, okay, it's jealousy…but I have every reason to be jealous. Stan and I used to be so close; now it's like…like I don't matter that much. God, this feels so terrible. No wonder I'm so sick…stressed, I mean. Not sick._

He closed his eyes, and sighed, all energy now drained from his body from the earlier nausea attack. _There's no way I'm sick, _he told himself. _Everything'll be fine. I am so not sick…_

* * *

_Ding-Dong. _"Hey Mom, could you get that?" Kyle called, not wanting to move from his comfortable position on the couch. It was about noon, and the good shows were finally on. After he had gone to bed, Kyle had slept until about eleven, when his mom had awoken him. She had not hinted about anything, so Kyle assumed that she did not know about his earlier throwing up incident. And he preferred it remained that way.

But he wondered if maybe he should have rinsed out his mouth and throat better, because now he could not stop coughing. And with every cough came that faint--but nasty nonetheless--aftertaste that he was becoming to despise (not that he hadn't before).

"Kyle, your little friends are here," Mrs. Broflovski called back, and Kyle smiled. Seeing his friends would make everything a little better. As long as Wendy didn't tag along with Stan. Because Stan obviously wouldn't have said no to her if she had asked to come.

Stan, Cartman, and Kenny--looking as though he was still pretty pissed about dying the day before--entered the room. "Hey Kyle," Stan greeted as he took a seta beside Kyle on the couch.

"Hey." Kyle tried his hardest not to grin; Wendy had not tagged along, so he and Stan might be able to--_Oh my God, do I even dare think it?_--talk or something without being interrupted. It was nice to be able to talk with your best friend. _Or so I've heard,_ Kyle thought sarcastically.

_"What's up?" _Kenny asked, staring at the television in a way that said, _"Don't even bother answering; I can see what's up."_

Kenny asked, staring at the television in a way that said, 

"Nothing much. Just--" Kyle paused and coughed, that disgusting taste coming back into his mouth. He grimaced, and then continued: "--watching TV."

"Yeah, we can see that," Cartman retorted, rolling his eyes. "God, don't you Jews ever say something that's actually important?"

"Shut up, Cartman," Kyle snapped, crossing his arms. "I don't need that right now, all right? I've had a bad day."

Stan frowned, looking over at Kyle in confusion. "A bad day?" he repeated, and Kyle nodded. "You know, it's only, like, noon."

"Yeah, I know." _Cough_. "It's been a bad day, anyway," he said, shifting his gaze from the television to Stan's face. "I mean, I did wake up at a quarter after five, so my day's been pretty long."

_"A quarter after five? Why the fuck would you do that?" _Kenny asked in horror.

"Kenny's right. Why would you wake up at five? On a Saturday? Unless you have to?" Stan asked, raising his eyebrows. "I mean…why?"

"Well, since I fell asleep at about four o'clock yesterday afternoon, waking up at five was pretty easy."

"What? Okay, again, why would you do that?" Stan asked, staring at Kyle as though he had gone completely insane. "It's a Friday night…there's always something to do…or watch."

"Dude, I know, all right? It's not like I planned it or anything. I just came home, got an aspirin, and fell asleep. I even told myself not to fall asleep, because I had homework to do." Kyle paused, shrugging his shoulders. "Again, I didn't mean to."

"Okay, Kyle, I know you're a smartass and all, but who, for the love of God, does homework on a Friday night?" Cartman asked.

"Well, uhh…" Kyle trailed off, feeling kind of skeptical about telling his friends that he had just forgotten about the weekend. Nevertheless: "…I just…forgot that it was…Friday--"

"What?!" Cartman interrupted, staring at Kyle in utter horror.

"You forgot that it was the weekend?" Stan asked.

"Yes, Stan…" _Cough._ "…and I know that it's a pretty stupid thing to do, but I just did. All right?" _Cough_. "But I just felt--" _Not sick, remember? _"--tired," he finished.

"You mean, sick?" Stan asked, cocking an eyebrow at Kyle. "Dude, you really need to tell your parents. I mean, I wasn't going to say anything, but you do look pale. Even more than usual."

"No, I'm not sick. I mean, sure, I--" _Cough_. "--keep getting headaches and I did throw up this morning and I can't eat anymore because it makes me…nauseous, but--" _Cough._

"Oh my God, would you stop _coughing_?!" Cartman shouted suddenly.

"Yeah, dude, you're totally sick. Maybe I should call Wendy; she's pretty smart, she could tell you what you have or what to do--"

_Wendy, Wendy, Wendy…God, can't you think about anyone else? _Kyle thought, and that's when he snapped: "You know what, Stan? Maybe you shouldn't tell me what I am! Especially since you haven't fucking noticed me in the past few weeks!"

Stan stopped, staring at Kyle, looking bewildered. "What the hell are you talking about?" he asked, but Kyle could tell that Stan was not completely oblivious about what he was talking about.

"You know what I'm talking about! Ever since you and that bitch got together, you've been totally ignoring me! And when you _do_ talk to me, it's always about Wendy! Well, you know what? I don't really _care_ about what you two do together, where you go…I don't fucking care! I just want to talk to my best friend without hearing 'Wendy' every five minutes!"

Stan's eyes narrowed. "Well, I'm sorry if you can't be happy for me! You know how much I like her. You know how depressed I was without her--"

"Yeah, you went fucking _Goth_! Like having me for a friend wasn't as important as having Wendy as a girlfriend. I know that you didn't get depressed or go Goth when we stopped being friends those times!" Kyle paused, coughing and grimacing from the taste. "It's like, if you had to choose between the two of us, you'd choose her." Stan's gaze flew to the floor and Kyle asked, quietly, "Wouldn't you?"

Stan stared at Kyle for a moment, and that silence was enough to let Kyle know what the answer was. "I know you're my friend, Stan. You've done a lot for me; the kidney, for example." Out of the corner of his eye, Kyle saw Cartman frown in anger at the memory of losing his kidney. "But I think, if it came right down to it, Wendy means more to you than I do."

Stan, without another word, turned on his heel and walked out of the living room and out of the Broflovski house. Kyle stared after him, rubbing at his temple. His head felt as though it could explode.

To Be Continued…


	3. Chapter Three

Disclaimer-I own nothing. The show belongs to its creators.

Author's Note-Thanks to "Red the Lupine Dragon," Chels-Dawg, Spice of Life, Faery Goddyss, Out of Tune, Leela's Tears, and doogy for reviewing.

This chapter gets a little bit supernatural toward the end, I think. But that's okay...anyway, please review! They help me write faster...

* * *

The Way It Is

By: Lamia Astaroth

* * *

A good friend can tell you  
what is the matter with you  
in a minute. He may not seem  
such a good friend after telling.  
-Arthur Brisbane

Do not consider painful  
what is good for you.  
-Euripides

Promises…are the counterfeit  
currency that inferior people  
exact from each other when  
unsure of their own strength.  
-Gustav Reichman: _Christmas Eve_

They say dreams are the  
windows of the soul--take  
a peek and you can see  
the inner workings,  
the nuts and bolts.  
-Henry Bromel

_

* * *

_

**CHAPTER THREE**

Kyle stared at the front door, dumbfounded. During his previous outburst, he had managed to only hear bits and pieces of what he had said to Stan. But the parts he had heard had been enough to tell him that he had told Stan _everything_. Everything he had been feeling the past week, everything that was upsetting him about Wendy. Everything.

"Oh…shit," he said, walking toward the front door. As he passed by the television, he heard Cartman's voice saying, "Hey, I can't see the TV!" Kyle casually gave Cartman the finger and continued outside.

He opened the front door and walked outside. As he strolled down the walkway toward the sidewalk, his walking quickly turned to running when he saw that Stan was already a block away.

"St--" He coughed again, and, with each step he took, he felt his head screaming out at him to _stop running! _But he ignored the pounding in his head and yelled, "Stan! Wait up!"

He was surprised…no, _amazed_ when he saw Stan stop in his tracks, allowing Kyle to catch up to him. Kyle stopped beside Stan on the sidewalk, clutching at his stomach. It felt like he was going to throw up again. _No, I don't want that again,_ he thought, swallowing.

"Stan," he continued, "about what I said before. I'm really sorry. I've just been really…mad lately because…" He paused, thinking about the possible reasons. He sighed; there was no way to deny it anymore: "Because you're right. I'm sick…I think. But I don't want to be, I guess. And everyone's been pissing me off about it, so when you started in on it, I just…snapped. And…like you said, I get sick more than anyone else in the class."

"Yeah, well, I'm sorry, too. I pushed you too hard on it, and I shouldn't have. But you were just complaining about it, and then denying it; it was pretty irritating for me, too, you know?"

Kyle nodded. "I can believe that. It really has been bothering me, but I hate being sick. I've been to the hospital more times in the past few years than practically everyone in our class put together. Minus Kenny, of course."

"Well, duh…" Stan and Kyle chuckled for a moment, but the laughter was quickly replaced by an unsettling silence. "I have a question, though, Kyle," Stan began, and Kyle looked at him. "All that stuff you said about Wendy…you meant it, right?"

Kyle shrugged. "Yeah, I guess I did. I feel like you've been ignoring me a lot lately. To, you know, hang out with her."

"She _is_ my girlfriend, Kyle," Stan said, defensively. "What am I supposed to do? _Not_ see her? Kind of defeats the whole reason of going out, doesn't it?"

"No, it's fine if you see her. It's when you ignore me _to_ see her that really pisses me off," Kyle replied, frowning. He didn't want to get into another Wendy argument with Stan, but if his best friend couldn't see how he was feeling, he had no real choice.

"When did I ever do _that_?" Stan asked, raising an eyebrow in doubt.

Kyle snorted. "Last Friday (not yesterday, the week before), you and I were going to go to the movies and what'd you do? You brought Wendy along." He smiled smugly, knowing that Stan had not even thought anything of bringing Wendy along to the movies that Friday.

God, what a night _that_ had been. Kyle had tried everything in his power to not be the third wheel--trying to include himself in the conversations and what-not--but he had been quite unsuccessful in doing so. Stan and Wendy had kept changing the subject of the conversation to something different every time he had joined in, and the way they had been eyeing each other had made Kyle just want to puke.

"She…she said she wanted to go," Stan said, but he looked and sounded beaten.

"I know she wanted to go…but you can say no. Like you did when I asked if you and I could hang out that Saturday. You said, 'No, I can't. I'm going to the park with Wendy.' Right?"

"Right, but...I didn't want to mess up our relationship. I mean, it's been going so well, and I don't want to mess up a good thing--"

"Oh my God, Stan, you're nine years old!" Kyle reminded him, rolling his eyes. "What do nine year olds know about relationships?" He paused a moment, and then continued, "I don't care if you date her. I just don't want to lose you because of it."

Stan frowned, looking (and Kyle was pleased to see it) guilty. He sighed deeply. "I'm sorry," he murmured. "God, I feel like such an asshole."

Kyle stifled a laugh. "You really were, you know? I thought you were going to phase me out completely. It really made me nervous."

Stan shook his head. "I'd never do that, dude. You really _are_ my best friend. Now," he said, changing the subject, "will you please, for the love of God, tell your mom that you're sick?"

Kyle grinned. "Yeah, sure…" He trailed off, rolling his eyes, but that smile still on his face. His best friend did not hate him, and he had apologized. Now maybe the headache would go away. His smile quickly faded when he noticed that it had not; it had, in fact, gotten worse since the last time he had thought about it.

Stan and Kyle walked down the sidewalk toward the Broflovski house. Kyle pressed a hand to his temple; he felt warm--although you never could diagnose a fever on yourself. As the two boys neared the house, Kyle stumbled over something (but when he looked back, he saw nothing there that he could have tripped over) and nearly fell to the concrete path.

Stan reached out and grabbed Kyle by the arm, stopping his friend from falling. "Calm down, Kyle," he said, jokingly. "Your mom's not gonna be _that_ mad."

Kyle nodded, murmuring, "I guess not." Stan released his friend's arm. Kyle took another step and was instantly hit with a wave of dizziness. "…whoa…" he mumbled, shaking his head. Was it getting dark already? Everything seemed to be covered with a transparent black sheet.

Stan turned and looked over at Kyle in confusion. "Dude, are you all right?" he asked. His question was immediately answered when Kyle fell to the grass on his yard. He landed with a soft _"Oomph"_ on the snow-covered grass.

"Dude, Kyle!" Stan exclaimed, rushing over to the spot where his friend was lying. "What the hell happened? Are you all ri--" He stopped in the middle of his question, kneeling down next to Kyle on the ground.

Sweat was pouring down Kyle's face and his cheeks were a florescent pink. However, when Stan touched Kyle's forehead, checking for a fever, he was surprised to find that Kyle was as cool as the snow he was lying in. "Kyle, what the--"

Stan grimaced when he saw that Kyle was beginning to convulse, his whole body twitching in a rhythmic (and sickening) sequence. "Hold…hold on, Kyle," Stan said, standing up. "I'll go get your parents."

He took a quick step, but then stopped when he felt a tug on his jacket. He looked down and saw that Kyle's fist had embedded itself in the bottom of his coat. "No," Kyle gasped, sitting upright. "No, I'm fine."

Stan stared, flabbergasted, at Kyle. "Are you kidding? It looked like you were having a…umm…a what's-it-called? A…seizure! You've gotta tell your parents. You were going to, anyway, so--"

Kyle shook his head. "No, I wasn't. I was going to go inside, and then distract you with TV or something, and then never tell them." He rubbed at his head, which was aching so badly that he would have needed about ten Advil to make the pain go away.

"Dude, why are you so afraid of telling them?" Stan asked.

"…I don't know," Kyle replied, softly. _That's another lie, _his mind scolded him. _You know why you don't want to tell them. You know perfectly well why._ "Stan," Kyle began, getting up to his feet, but still using Stan as support, "you gotta promise me you won't tell anyone."

Stan frowned, kicking at the snow in front of him. "I-I don't know…I really think you should tell someone. I mean, what if you're _really_ sick. What if something happens--?"

"_Nothing_ is going to happen, Stan!" Kyle retorted, letting go of Stan. He swayed a bit and nearly fell over again. He held on to Stan again, not wanting to fall into the snow. "Nothing's gonna happen," he said again, reassuringly. "Please, Stan, you've gotta promise me."

Kyle stared at Stan with big, pleading eyes, and Stan sighed. "All…all right. I promise. But I still think that you should tell someone; your parents, Chef, hell, tell _my_ parents, if you want…"

"Okay, I promise, Stan, if it gets any worse, I'll tell someone, okay?" Kyle said, smiling a small smile. _You know that even if it _does_ get worse, you're not going to tell anyone,_ his mind told him. Kyle frowned, pushing that voice to the back of his head, where he hoped it would stay.

"Okay, good," Stan said, sounding satisfied. He and Kyle walked back inside the Broflovski house, where Kenny and Cartman were still watching television, as though nothing had happened.

"Oh, that's _so sweet_," Cartman cooed, when Kyle and Stan walked in together. "Looks like you two are boyfriend and girlfriend again."

Stan was momentarily confused by Cartman's statement until he noticed that Kyle was still holding on to him. He locked eyes with Kyle and gave him a _What are you doing?_ look, which Kyle replied with an _I'm sorry but I have to_ look. Stan nodded, saying he understood, and he and Kyle walked over to the couch.

Once he was sitting down on the couch, Kyle felt more stabilized and finally was able to let go of Stan. He rested his head on the back of the couch, breathing deeply. He felt exhausted. And after that whole spasm-attack he had just had, he was not surprised.

"_It looked like you were having a…a seizure!"_ Stan's words kept repeating themselves over and over in Kyle's head. A seizure? No, he hadn't had a seizure…it must have been something else.

_Like what?_ his mind asked him. _I don't know,_ Kyle replied. _Something else…like a panic-attack from thinking about telling my parents. Yeah, that's what it must've been. Of course._ Kyle felt foolish for even thinking something so stupid, but he felt satisfied, so he did not push himself any further.

"_You're a smart boy"_ his father had told him this morning. _"A smart boy."_ Kyle rolled his eyes. _Yeah, a _real_ smart boy…smart enough to know not to tell my parents that I'm sick. _Real_ smart._

For a moment, Kyle considered standing up and walking up to his parents and just telling them that he was sick. If he told them that he had just had a seizure, then they would take him to the hospital, and…

_No! No hospitals. I don't want to go there. There's no way. I'm fine._

When had he been so afraid to go to the hospital? The last time he had been there had been…he could not even remember the exact last time he had been in a hospital. _There was the kidney thing, and the hemorrhoid thing, and…_

That was two too many right there. Unknown to everyone else, he hated going anywhere where you were put to sleep and then people slash at you with knives and whatever else they had…and this was supposed to make people _better?_ He did not understand the logic of it all…

_I mean, sure, they've helped me before, but what if they can't this time? If I go to the hospital, and they say there's nothing they can do…that's it. Done. I don't want that. Nope, I'm going to stay right here where it's safe._

"Hello, booby," Shelia Broflovski greeted, entering the living room. "I thought I heard you leave, Kyle. What happened?"

Kyle coughed nervously, bringing his hands up to his face, hoping that it was not as red as it had been earlier. "Oh, I just…needed some fresh air," he lied, and rather feebly, Stan thought, but it must have been reason enough for Mrs. Broflovski, because she smiled and left the room.

Stan cast a desperate look at Kyle. Kyle, in reply, shook his head. Stan's eyes fell, and he returned his gaze back to the television. _I wish he could understand,_ Kyle thought, sadly. He turned his gaze back to the TV as well, wincing each time his head pulsated, a subconscious begging for him to do something about it.

_No_, he thought, crossing his arms tightly over his chest and trying his hardest to focus on whatever was on the television, but could not seem to concentrate. There was too much happening; his head, his earlier fight with Stan, and, of course, that (_Seizure_) thing that had happened out in the front yard.

But it would all get better, he assured himself. Everything would get better if no one else found out.

* * *

Saturday night, nothing to do…Kyle had asked Stan, Cartman, and Kenny, before they left his house earlier that day, if they wanted to go and do something, but Stan had said no (right off the bat, Kyle had noticed), and Cartman and Kenny followed suit, as if they knew something… 

But Kyle knew that they did not. Stan would keep his word, like he always did. _I hope,_ Kyle added in his mind. He usually did not have any reason to doubt Stan's word of silence, but Stan seemed to think that this was a big deal, so who knew what he would do? _He'd better not tell._

Why did everything about "telling" bother him so much? _Well, besides the whole, I could go to the hospital and die thing._ But perhaps that was it; hospitals were the place where people usually died. And he was only nine years old, and, as most nine year olds are, was not ready to die just yet. Because he was not like Kenny--he would not come back.

What a lucky bastard, that Kenny was. If you looked at it in a sense that he would never die; never would have to worry about missing out on anything. He would always have another chance.

That was when Kyle remembered: the last time he had been in a hospital had been when Kenny had _really_ died (well, excluding those two times when Cartman had gone into a coma from hitting his head, but those had only happened because Cartman was such a dumbass). Sure, he had come back and all, but that's when he had _really _died. And maybe that was what bothered Kyle the most about it…

Was he completely stupid for not telling his parents? He assumed that he was, but good sense and intelligence usually takes a back seat to fear. Just ask anyone who has been in a horror movie. Sure, it is easy for the audience to say, "Hide in the closet!" or "Run!" because they are not the ones being chased by the manic with a chainsaw or whatever...

The point was, dying in a hospital at nine years old was terrifying, and Kyle had no intention of letting that happen. It seemed better just to pretend that everything is fine, rather than be forced to listen to bad news. It was better that way for his parents as well. _Why worry them that way? Let them be happy._

_"You'll work through it," his father's voice told him. "You're a smart boy."_

Tears sprang to Kyle Broflovski's eyes._ You're wrong, Dad,_ he thought_. I will work through it, but I'm not a smart boy._ He quickly wiped away the tears that threatened to fall. His parents had so much confidence in him to be smart, and he was letting them down, just because of a silly (_It doesn't seem silly to me, though,_ Kyle thought) fear of death. Well, not so much "death" as being told that he was going to die. And if it came from a doctor, that was pretty much a death sentence right there.

He thought of his earlier promise to Stan and nodded in the darkness of his bedroom._ "If it gets worse,"_ he murmured to himself,_ "I will tell them."_ And, this time, he meant it.

_But only if it gets worse,_ he added in his mind._ Until then, no one's going to find out._

He pulled the covers of his bed up to his chin, sighing, looking up at the faint image of his _"Go Cows!"_ poster. He hated the time right before falling asleep; it was the time where the subconscious really talks to you, reminding you of all of the bad or stupid things that you've done in your life. And you have to listen; it's the only voice around, after all.

He squeezed his eyes closed, trying to focus on nothing (as ridiculous as it sounded, it really did help him fall asleep--thinking of nothing), waiting for sleep to take him over.

But it would not come. Every time he would get close to that stage of relaxation where sleep begins, that subconscious voice would whisper in his ear, _"You're a smart boy, Kyle. You'll work through it. Because you're a _smart boy!"

"Shut up," Kyle mumbled through gritted teeth. "Shut _up_! I'm trying to sleep…"

"Kyle, did you say something?" Sheila asked from behind his closed bedroom door.

_Spying on me, Mom?_ Kyle wanted to ask, but knew better. She had probably just been passing through, after all. No reason to get pissed off. None at all. "No, Mom. Just trying to sleep," he replied.

"Okay boobala, you sleep well, now, okay?" Shelia said, and Kyle heard her footsteps retreating from the door.

He turned on his side, closing his eyes again, focusing on nothing. He yawned loudly, trying to coax himself into falling asleep. This time, when he entered that stage of relaxation where sleep began, there was no voice to pull him out of it, and he (finally) was able to fall asleep.

* * *

"_Mom?" Kyle called out. "Dad? Where are you guys?" He was standing in a white hallway; no doors, no windows, just white…everywhere. "Where the hell--" He squinted his eyes and saw a distance down the hallway was a gray rectangle--a door, perhaps. _

That was good enough for him; he began walking down the hallway. The walls had been painted such a bright white color that it strained his eyes to even look at them. Instead, he kept his eyes ahead, focusing on that gray door (or what he hoped was a door).

After what felt like an hour of walking--he had even lost his breath and his heart was speeding--Kyle finally reached that gray door. He was elated to find that it was, in fact, a door, not just some shadow or hallucination. He placed his hand on the doorknob, which had been painted a gray that matched the door so perfectly that, from a distance, you could not even tell that there was a doorknob.

_He pushed the door open. On the other side of the gray door was a white room. Not as white as the hallway had been, however; Kyle could actually look at the walls without his eyes throbbing. _

In the white room stood a white bed, with white sheets, white covers, white everything._ There was a lump beneath the covers, Kyle saw, and he began to approach the bed with an uneasy pace. God only knew what was in that bed and he thought that the smart thing he could do was to just turn around and leave._

"You're a smart boy…"

_"Dad?" Kyle asked the room, looking around, panicky. His eyes flew back to the bed, as if magnetized. Pushing all good sense aside, Kyle walked toward the bed. "This is not a good idea," he told himself, but it was too late to change his mind; he was standing beside the bed, looking down at..._

_He screamed a mind-shattering scream that caused the white paint to chip away from the walls and leave nothing but a black nothingness._

_Still screaming, Kyle fell to the cold, white floor, staring up at the dark, dark ceiling._

"You're a smart boy."

_The ceiling was black, the walls were black, and now the floor was black and he felt himself falling again… _

"…Kyle…"

"_No!" he shouted back, eyes crushed together, hands covering his eyes. Was he still falling? Was he still…

* * *

_

…falling?

"Kyle, booby, are you all right?" Shelia Broflovski asked, and Kyle opened his eyes. He was in his room again, and his parents were standing over him. They looked worried. What had happened?

The dream. Kyle shuddered as it all came flying back to him. That dream. He had screamed...and he must have screamed out loud, because his throat felt scratchy. He swallowed. "…yeah, I'm all right," he replied in response to his mother's question.

"We heard you screaming, son," Gerald Broflovski stated, placing a hand on Kyle's shoulder.

"It was just a nightmare," Kyle replied, honestly. _Yes, finally some honesty!_ "I'm all right now." _And another lie…nice job._

"Would you like to talk about it?" Shelia asked.

"No!" Kyle replied instantly. If there was anything he did not want to do, it was relive _that_ dream. And there was no way his mother was going to make him. No way in Hell.

Shelia and Gerald exchanged exasperated looks with each other, but respected Kyle's wishes: "All right, honey. Try to get back to sleep, okay? Tomorrow's Sunday, which means the next day is a school day, and you don't want to be tired."

"Okay, Mom," Kyle replied, rather curtly, apparently, because his mother flashed him an angry look, which quickly changed back into a loving look when she said goodnight.

Gerald closed the door to Kyle's room and Kyle was alone again, staring up at the ceiling, his heart still racing from the nightmare he had just had.

For the ninth consecutive day, he had had a dream--or in this case, nightmare--that seemed far too real to have been a figment of his subconscious. They had been, of course, Kyle was not going to argue _that_, but they were so…nerve-racking that sometimes he wondered what "real" really was.

Everything from that nightmare he could remember; the white hallway, the gray door, the white room, the white bed…what had been _in_ the white bed. He trembled beneath his covers. Just _thinking _about it scared him. After all, it _had_ been terrifying…

…looking into his own dead face.

_To Be Continued…_


	4. Chapter Four

Disclaimer-I own nothing. The show belongs to its creators.

Author's Note-I'm sorry for the delay. To be brief, school sucks. They gave me so much homework that I barely had time to write, much less do any research for this chapter, which required quite a bit. Thanks Google! But I'm not sure if I'm happy with the ending of this chapter; I may revise it, depending on the reviews.

And thanks to those who reviewed: Faery Goddyss, doogy, Leela's Tears, "Janelle," Chels-Dawg, Red the Lupine Dragon, Luna Seraph, and Out of Tune.

Also, someone mentioned that you can't talk during a seizure. I thought about that before choosing to write it, and almost didn't do it, but then I did some research and discovered that some types of seizures, like a partial (focal) seizure (which is what Kyle had), do not make you go unconscious or anything, and can sometimes last only a few seconds. I hope that explains it better…I don't want any confusion!

* * *

The Way It Is

By: Lamia Astaroth

* * *

Nothing travels faster  
than the speed of light  
with the possible exception  
of bad news, which obeys  
its own special laws.  
-Douglas Adams

A man's subconscious self is  
not the ideal companion. It  
lurks for the greater part of  
his life in some dark den of  
its own, hidden away, and  
emerges only to taunt and  
deride and increase the  
misery of a miserable hour.  
-P.G. Wodehouse

I'm frightened by what I see,  
But somehow I know that there's  
much more to come. Immobilized  
by my fear, and soon to be  
blinded by tears.  
-Evanescence "Whisper"

* * *

**CHAPTER FOUR**

Kyle stayed up the rest of the night, unable to fall asleep, or even do so much as have the lights be turned off. Because he kept seeing what he had dreamed; that person in the bed who could have been no one else but himself.

After all, who else _could_ it have been? Even with the sunken-in eyes, the deathly-white face, he had known that it was him. He had felt it as soon as he had seen it.

_Ugh, why am I acting like it actually happened? _he asked himself, shuddering even beneath the warm covers. _It was just a dream. People dream fucked up things all the time. That's what you're supposed to do!_

He grunted, sitting upright in his bed. He glanced quickly at his clock: _4:12 am._ "Screw this," he murmured, scrambling out of bed. He quickly got dressed into his usual attire and opened the door to his room. _Dude, what is it with me and waking up so goddamn early? Why not six, or seven, even, when it's actually bright enough to see? Or at least at a time where I can visit my friends without completely pissing them off?_

Nevertheless, sun or no sun, friends or no friends, he had to get outside. Breathe the air, look up at the sky…all of that hippie shit. He needed to get _out_ and just be alone; he needed to think. _God, when was the last time I thought _that? he asked himself, rolling his eyes. _Try "never." _

Kyle crept downstairs, skipping over the select few stairs which, as he had learned the previous day, squeak the loudest. As he passed by the kitchen, he momentarily considered writing a note that said where he would be on a sticky note and putting it on the fridge. He quickly decided against it, however, knowing that his parents would not be up until about seven-ish, and he fully intended on being back by then. _I totally don't want to "breathe the air" for over three hours._

He unlocked the front door and opened it, wincing as he heard the hinges creaking. _Jesus, does _everything_ in this house squeak?_ he wondered. He paused for a moment, and, when he did not hear anyone waking up, quickly left his house, shutting the door behind him.

He plodded down the front steps and made his way toward the street. Luckily for him, the street lights were all lit up, and the sky was perfectly clear, revealing the nearly-full moon and stars, providing him with more than enough light to walk wherever he needed to go. _I just wish I knew where that was,_ he thought to himself.

The spot on his lawn where he had collapsed (_But it had only happened for a second, _he added) was already covered up with a fresh layer of snow. He glanced at the spot, and then continued down the street without another thought of it.

Well, that was what he _wanted_ to have happen, but his mind simply would not stop. It was replaying yesterday's event over and over in his mind; one second, he had been standing up, the next second, he had been on the ground, shaking and scared and…

It could not have been a seizure, could it? After all, Kyle had seen movies where, when someone had had a seizure, they almost always blacked out and were taken immediately to the hospital. Why had _that_ not happened to _him_? Why had _his_…whatever it had been lasted only a little while, and why, for God's sake, hadn't he passed out? _So, there, maybe it hadn't been a seizure, just a…momentary body…issue._

_Oh, cut the crap, Kyle,_ he told himself. _You know perfectly well what you had yesterday. You knew it right when it happened…only maybe it was just…a small one._

He swallowed, sticking his gloved hands into his pockets. "But if I had a small one," he whispered, "doesn't that mean I can have a _big_ one?"

_Yeah, and _then_ you can black out and go to the hospital…just like in the movies._ He sighed. "Great…just fucking _great_," he mumbled, staring down at the gray sidewalk, not watching where he was going, and, quite frankly, not caring.

Every so often he would turn his head back toward the direction he was coming from, almost expecting to see his mother sprinting toward him, shouting, _"Kyle, what the hell are you doing? Get back inside this instant! You'll freeze to death!"_ "Talk about paranoid," he said, with a chuckle.

He paused as he reached Stan's house. He looked up into the window of Stan's bedroom and almost considered throwing a rock at Stan's window, waking Stan up, and telling him all about his messed up dream.

"No," Kyle said, shaking his head. "No, then he'll _definitely_ make me tell someone." With that in mind, he continued down the path, head bowed, hands still deep within his pockets.

The thick silence around him seemed to be an invitation for his mind to keep on going: _Would anyone really care if I died?_ he wondered, tearing his eyes away from the pavement and looking up at the black sky. _I mean, would anyone care? Really?_

It was a horrible thing to think, and he knew it, but the question was lingering in his mind, wanting to be answered, _needing_ to be answered. But it would have to remain unknown until something _did_ happen; until that day that he _did_ die.

"Well, then I'll just have to wait," he told himself, but he could not help himself from wondering. He assumed that a select few, yes, they would care, they would miss him. His parents belonged to that group, of course. Ike, on the other hand, was probably too young to even know what "death" was just yet.

But it was not his family caring that worried him. It was his friends, his classmates… would they _really_ give a shit if he was gone? Aside from a small, _"Oh, how sad!"_ would they even think twice about it? Would they be upset? Or would they just put on some bullshit act so that people would not think that they were insensitive assholes?

These questions flew through Kyle's mind, plaguing him...and he was unable to come up with a definite answer for any of them.

He thought of his class, and he could only think of one person who would truly care: Stan. And _his_ mourning probably would not even last that long, because Stan had his precious Wendy there to comfort him. Cartman (he was ninety-nine percent positive) would not give a shit; the only reason he might even be a _little_ bit sad would be because there would be no more Jews left in the class to torment.

Kenny...well, he might be sad. You never really could tell with Kenny, especially since he had experienced death so many times. "Okay, so one and a half people would care if I was gone. Wow, that feels good," he muttered sarcastically.

He sort of wished that everyone, at one time in their life, would be able to see how life would be if they were gone. A "Dead for a Day" type of thing. "What's that called, again?" he asked aloud, not really expecting someone to answer. He could not remember, and did not press himself too hard on it.

"Wow, I usually don't think about death this much. I hope that's not some kind of sign…" He shook his head, feigning a laugh. "Don't be stupid. That's just bullcrap. 'Some kind of sign.' Ha." Still, he felt unsure.

Kyle stopped in his tracks, looking up for the first time in God only knew how long. He was standing just in front of Stark's Pond. He walked up to the edge of the pond and sat down in the thin layer of snow, not noticing (although he probably would not have cared even if he _had _noticed) that the seat of his pants was getting wet.

He plunged one hand into the snow and picked out a rock. He stared at the blue-gray stone for a moment, and then tossed it onto the ice. He watched as it skimmed along the smooth surface, flying to the opposite side of the pond. He sighed, closing his eyes and crossing his legs in front of him.

His eyes opened as something gently brushed his nose. Kyle looked up at the dark sky and realized that it was beginning to snow. "I guess I should head back--" he said aloud, casting a glance at the sky.

Kyle began to stand up, when he froze in place, his eyes glued to the sky. Was it just him, or did the sky look…different than it had a moment earlier? There seemed to be a faint, but noticeable, zigzag shape streaming down the sky. It would have passed for lightning, if it had not appeared to be frozen in time.

He stared at the shape, nearly entranced. _The sky can't just change like that, can it?_ he wondered. He wetted his lips, breaking his gaze free of the sky. _Don't worry about it,_ he told himself. With one last glance at that shape in the sky, he turned and began to head back toward his home. However, when he looked down at the ground, he could still see that faint zigzag shape. He rubbed quickly at his eyes, and then continued walking.

He stopped in his tracks again when a sharp pain struck through his abdomen. He sucked in breath at the sudden pain, nearly doubling over. The pain quickly subsided, and he stood upright again. "Too much walking," he said, searching for a good explanation. "Just a stitch--"

_Denial_. He knew what was about to happen; he could _feel_ it happening. He could even sense it happening (_"Doesn't that mean I can have a _big_ one?"_). He took in a breath of air, trying to calm himself, when another wrench of pain burst through his stomach. He gasped loudly at the sudden pain, stumbling and falling to his knees. "Motherfucker--" he groaned, clutching at his abdomen.

Suddenly, in less than a second, everything went numb--his stomach, his legs, everything. Unable to feel anything anymore, he crumpled and fell into the snow. As though in a déjà-vu, he felt his whole body going rigid, as it had the day before. His mind was screaming for help, but his mouth was empty…

Then, as suddenly as it had begun, the convulsion ended and the feeling was returned to his body. His mind was swimming with thoughts of denial, confusion, and, most of all, fear. He struggled to his feet, brushing the snow off of the side of his face. He staggered a few steps forward, then stopped.

He was tired--exhausted, to be more precise. His eyes were burning and sore, desiring sleep or, at the very least, some rest. Kyle looked around through tired eyes and saw, to his relief, an empty park bench. He walked over to the bench, wiped the snow off of it, and lay down on the cold wood. _I'll just rest for a minute,_ he thought, removing his hat and placing it beneath his head as a pillow. _They'll never even know I was gone,_ he added, thinking of his parents.

His eyes closed and, before he even realized it, he had fallen to sleep on that bench near Stark's Pond.

* * *

"Jesus Christ, Stan, don't you know what time it is?" Cartman demanded, as he slumped up Stan's walkway toward the front steps, where Stan and Kenny were sitting, waiting for him. 

"Yeah, it's six thirty in the morning. So what? You'd have to be up for church soon, anyway, so don't complain about it, fatass," Stan retorted. "Besides, I really need to talk to you guys."

_"Shouldn't we wait 'til Kyle gets here?"_ Kenny inquired.

"No, because, the thing is, it's _about_ Kyle," Stan replied, glancing quickly around to make sure that no one was eavesdropping on their conversation. _Although, who_ would_ be at six in the morning?_ he asked himself.

"Oh my God, Stan, are you coming out of the closet?" Cartman asked, recoiling in mock disgust. "Why to us? Why can't it be to Chef or...or to Mr. Garrison--you know, someone who would 'understand' you--"

"Dammit, Cartman, I'm not gay! That's not what this is about!" Stan snapped, standing up and, for a moment, it looked like he was about to charge at Cartman. Instead, however, he sat back down on the stairs. "Listen guys, I promised Kyle I wouldn't say anything, but--"

"--let me guess, he finally confessed his undying love for you after all these years--" Cartman began, smiling cynically.

"Shut the fuck up, Cartman...I don't know why I even asked you to come. I mean, this is pretty big, and I think it's really important that I tell someone, or else Kyle might get hurt or something."

"All right, all right." Cartman held up his hands in defeat, plopping down on the stairs next to Kenny. "What's wrong with the Jew?"

Stan rolled his eyes, but began, "You know yesterday, after I left and then he went outside to get me and apologize?" Kenny and Cartman nodded, and Stan continued, "Well, when we were just coming up to his house, he, like, collapsed and started…con…" Stan frowned, struggling to remember the exact word. "…convulsing, and stuff. It was really scary; it looked like he was having a seizure. I tried to get inside and tell you guys, but he told me not to.

"Then, the next thing I know, he's telling me that I can't tell anyone how sick he is, and I can't do that. What if what he's got is really bad?"

Cartman scoffed. "Please. Kyle's probably just fakin'. Probably to get you to pay attention to him, Stan. After all, ever since you got back together with that bitch, Wendy, you have been paying less and less attention to him."

Stan flashed an angry glare at Cartman. "Don't call Wendy a bitch, fatass! And how would you even know if I was paying less attention to Kyle? Plus, why would you even _care_? You don't exactly _like_ him, Cartman."

Cartman shrugged. "Hey, he's still my friend. Besides, if you spend less time with _him, _he spends more time around me. _That's_ how I know, Stanley." He smiled smugly, crossing his chubby arms over his wide chest.

Kenny piped in, _"Eric's got a point, Stan. I've never seen Kyle as much as I have this past week."_

"Yeah," Cartman agreed, happy to be right about something. "But I've gotta tell you, Stan; you blowing off Kyle to go ice skating with Wendy last week was _priceless_! I mean, the look on Kyle's face was just--" He chuckled at the memory. "--he looked so sad! It was _awesome_."

Stan stared at Cartman, speechless. If _Cartman, _of all people, noticed that he was ignoring Kyle, that had to say _something_, didn't it? _No, no way...he's just saying it to piss me off._ Although, he could not argue with the fact that he and Wendy _had_ done a lot of stuff together the previous week, whether it had been ice skating, movies, or whatever, it had always been at a time that he and Kyle had usually done stuff together. _Am I just noticing this _now? he wondered, feeling disgusted with himself.

_"So, what the hell are we going to do about Kyle?"_ Kenny asked, changing the subject. _"I mean, it's obvious he doesn't give a rat's ass if he's sick, so what the fuck_ can_ we do?"_

Stan shrugged. "I really don't know," he replied, honestly. "That's why I called you guys over here; to come up with a plan or something. I really think he should tell his parents, or go to the doctor, but, for some reason, he _really_ doesn't want to."

"Well, he probably just doesn't want to pay. You know how Jews can be. Always gotta be so goddamn clingy with their money," Cartman replied, rolling his eyes. "I say, if he doesn't wanna pay for a doctor, that's _his_ problem."

"You know, I seriously doubt that money is the issue, dumbass," Stan responded, shaking his head. "I wish that he would just _tell_ me what the fuck his problem is, but he's been so goddamn stubborn lately that he--"

_"Jesus, Stan, don't you get it? He's not being stubborn; he's just freaking out over being screwed over again. Even _I_ can tell that,"_ Kenny interrupted, angrily. _"Whenever he tried to talk to you last week, it was always, 'Oh, Wendy and I' or whatever the fuck you said. It's getting pretty fucking annoying, Stan! It's fucking _great_ that you and Wendy are dating again, but we've heard enough about it, for the love of _God!_"_

Stan goggled at Kenny, surprised by the hooded boy's sudden outburst. "Have…have I really been _that_ bad?" he asked, softly.

"Hell yeah," Kenny and Cartman replied in unison, and Stan looked taken aback. "But, but," Stan began, stammering, "I was just…happy--"

_"Yeah, well, maybe you should just go and be 'happy' in your own room, Stan_," Kenny added, _"because we really don't need to hear about Wendy every day, especially since she's such a bitch--" _

"Stop calling Wendy a bitch!" Stan shouted. "Maybe you're right, though," he added, calmly. "Do you think that's really why Kyle's sick?"

"Of course that's the goddamn reason," Cartman replied. "He's not really sick. He probably never has been…it's all just been some bullshit cry for attention."

Stan groaned inwardly. "Goddammit," he murmured, holding his head in his hands. _So I've got to feel _guilty_ about dating Wendy again? That's not fair! Maybe I could hold back on talking about her, though_, he thought.

The front door behind them creaked open, and Mrs. Marsh stepped outside, a cordless phone in one hand, the other hand covering the receiver. "Oh," she said, as she looked over the three boys who were sitting on the stoop. "No, Sheila, he's not here," she said, turning back to the phone. "Hold on a moment." She looked down at Stan and asked, "Stan, has Kyle been over at all today?"

Stan looked back up at his mother, a tightness forming in the pit of his stomach. "No," he replied. "I haven't seen him since yesterday afternoon."

"No, Shelia, Stan says he hasn't seen him since yesterday…hold on, I'll ask him. Stan, did Kyle say anything about going somewhere this morning?"

"N-No," Stan replied, his voice shaking.

"No, he says he didn't…what's that? Oh my…yes, yes, I'll wait a moment." Stan stared up at his mother, his stomach churning like mad. _What's going on?_ he wanted to ask, but it had sounded like his mother had not known too much. After a few minutes, Sharon said, "Yes, I'm still here. Oh…oh my! Yes…yes, we'll be right there." She pressed a button on the phone, disconnecting the call.

"What…what was that, Mom?" Stan asked, not wanting to know the answer, although a part of him needed to.

"That was Shelia Broflovski," Sharon Marsh began, as though Stan had not been able to figure that out on his own. "She said that she went into Kyle's room this morning and Kyle wasn't there. She called the police and, just a few seconds ago, got a call from her husband. He said that he found Kyle out near Stark's Pond, sleeping on one of the benches. He told her that he looked violently ill, probably from sleeping out in the cold for so long, so he took him to Hells Pass Hospital. And apparently he was in pretty bad shape, because they took him to the emergency room."

"Oh my God," Stan said, looking at his mother in horror. "Mom, we've…we've gotta go…"

"I know, sweetie, but we need to pick up Mrs. Broflovski at her house--her husband used their car to go out and look for Kyle."

"Okay," Stan replied, feebly, and his mother went back inside the house to get her husband. Stan returned his gaze back to his two friends, his eyes wide. "You-You guys wanna come, right?"

_"Yeah, we'll come,"_ Kenny agreed, but Cartman, on the other hand, did not look as eager. _"Right, Eric?"_

Cartman grumbled, standing up from the stoop. "You guys are so stupid! It's like I told you before; Kyle's fakin'! Why, in the name of all that is holy, don't you believe me? You're _really_ going to fall for his bullshit act? God, you guys are so--"

"Well, fine, Cartman. Don't come," Stan interjected, standing up as well. "I bet Kyle'll get better sooner, anyway, if he doesn't have to stare at your fat ass all day!"

"'ey! I'm not fat, gaywad!" Cartman retorted, turning his back to Stan and walking down the walkway indignantly. When he reached the intersection of the walkway and sideway, he turned his head and shouted, "I can't wait to see you guys' faces when you find out you've been_ screwed with_!" With that, he turned and continued walking down the sidewalk and out of sight.

_"You know, he's probably just really pissed off 'cause he's worried," _Kenny stated, voicing exactly what Stan had been thinking.

"I know," Stan replied, nodding. "But if he wants to be a dick about it, let him."

Mr. and Mrs. Marsh reappeared in the doorway a few minutes after Cartman had disappeared from sight, Mr. Marsh holding the keys to the car in one hand. "Okay, you three--" Sharon Marsh began, and then looked around for a moment. "Why, what happened to Eric?"

"He went home," Stan replied, and that short response must have been reason enough, because Mr. Marsh nodded and said, "Okay, let's get over to the Broflovski house; Shelia won't want to wait."

He had been correct with that statement; as soon as they arrived at Kyle's house, Sheila Broflovski looked as though she had been standing there for over a week; she looked angry, worried, and impatient, all at the same time. She had Ike's tiny hand clasped in her own, and Ike did not look too pleased about being dragged around.

Sheila and Ike, with much difficulty, squeezed into the Marsh's car and the six of them drove down to Hells Pass Hospital, each of them expecting no less than the worst.

* * *

_Beep…beep._ Kyle awoke to the sound of an automated bleeping. His eyelids fluttered open and he found himself peering into the anxious face of his father. 

"Kyle?" he heard his father say. "How are you feeling?"

"Uhh…" His head was throbbing and everything seemed so…hazy. "What…?" he muttered. His vision was beginning to clear, but he still could not make out where he was; all he could clearly see was his father's face. "What happened?"

"Well, I was hoping _you_ would be able to tell _me_, Kyle," Mr. Broflovski replied, his voice now stern and denouncing. He crossed his arms, looking at his son, waiting edgily for a reply.

Kyle stared at his father for a moment, and then his present surroundings finally became identifiable. His eyes settled on the covers of his small bed, and then flew to all of the machinery that he was hooked up to. _Holy shit, dude! No way! _he thought, beginning to panic. "Why am I in the hospital?" he asked, his voice wavering from the panic he felt.

Gerald Broflovski cocked an eyebrow at his son. "Well, son, sleeping on a cold bench, in the snow, without so much as a blanket, isn't exactly healthy for _anyone_, much less a nine year old boy," he replied, trying to keep his paternal stance.

Kyle looked completely taken aback by his father's words, and this reaction made Mr. Broflovski wonder if Kyle was either trying to pull one over on him to get out of trouble, or that he really _was_ confused.

"What are you talking about, Dad? When did I go outside?"

The sheer befuddlement in Kyle's voice made Mr. Broflovski even more concerned and, at the same time, more suspicious. Either way, he decided to answer his son's question: "We're not exactly sure_ when_ you left, but we're assuming that it was still dark out, or else you might not have fallen asleep…but, again, we're not sure. Maybe _you'd_ like to tell us," he added, hoping that Kyle would simply confess; he had already been caught, after all, so what else _could_ he do?

Still, however, Kyle had a look on his face that told his father that he perhaps did not know what had happened. "How…how long have I been here?" Kyle asked, as though he had not heard his father's request.

"About two hours," his father replied immediately, as though he had been counting the minutes ever since arriving (which he practically had been doing). "Well, two hours and forty minutes, if you count the time you spent in the ER."

Kyle swallowed a lump that had formed in his throat. "Why'd I go there?" he asked, weakly, his green eyes wide and flickering with a level of fear that made Mr. Broflovski even more nervous than he had been when he had found Kyle on that bench near Stark's Pond.

"You had a high fever, and they had to bring it down. It was 103.8 degrees, if I remember correctly. It took them awhile to bring it down. All we're waiting for now are the results of all the tests they ran on you, then you'll be one step closer to going home."

When Kyle did not appear to be any less upset than he had been when he had first awoke, Gerald, in an attempt to uplift his son's spirits, added, "By the way, Stan and Kenny are here. They're in the cafeteria with Ike and your mother right now."

"Really?" Kyle asked, giving his father a small smile. "Well, it would be nice to talk to them…" His gaze fell back down to the sheets. "God, Stan was right…" he mumbled under his breath.

"What was that?" Mr. Broflovski asked, leaning in to hear Kyle better.

"Oh, nothing…Dad, can…can you go find them?" Kyle asked.

"Of course, son," Mr. Broflovski replied, standing up from his chair, which he had placed beside Kyle's bed, and walking out of the room.

"What's Dad talking about?" Kyle asked himself. "I never went outside! God, it's like I'm going crazy or something! I mean, the last thing I remember is that damn dream. Maybe I was sleepwalking…" _Stop talking to yourself,_ his mind told him.

"Hey Kyle." Kyle looked up at the doorway and saw Stan and Kenny entering his room. He greeted them with a half-hearted grin, trying to show them that he was not in too bad of shape. The smile must not have been convincing enough, because Stan remarked, "Dude, you look like shit."

Kyle's smile faded and he nodded. "Yeah, I feel like shit, too," he said. _No sense denying it now; I mean, look where I am._

_"What the fuck happened?"_ Kenny asked after a short, but awkward, silence, voicing what both he and Stan had been thinking since arriving at Hells Pass Hospital.

"I…I don't know. I can't remember anything that happened. The last thing I can remember is waking up last night after this messed up dream I had. Whatever happened between then and now is just…not there," he replied, hoping his friends would believe him; he did not think that his dad had accepted his response earlier.

"That's weird, Kyle…you'd think you'd remember something like sneaking out and going outside. I mean, unless you were sleepwalking or something," Stan commented.

For a moment, Kyle wondered if Stan and Kenny had heard him while he was talking to himself. He supposed that it did not matter; it was not as if they had not already assumed that something was wrong with him. After the past few days, what else _could_ they believe?

"…so, when are you getting out of here?" Stan asked, breaking the second awkward silence that had fallen over the three of them.

Kyle shrugged. "I don't know. My dad said that all the doctors need to do is get the results for some tests, and then I'll probably be out of here a little after that. At least, I hope so…I hate it here."

"Yeah," Stan and Kenny replied simultaneously. "Well, when you _do_ get out, we should all--" Stan began, but was cut off by Mr. Broflovski, who stuck his head in the doorway to call to them:

"Stan, your parents are on their way to take you and Kenny home."

"Oh, okay," Stan replied, looking back at Kyle. "I'll see you later, dude."

_"See ya'," _Kenny said, turning and walking with Stan toward the doorway.

"'Bye, guys," Kyle called as Stan and Kenny walked out of his room. "God, this sucks so much," he mumbled to himself, tugging in annoyance at the sheets on his bed. "Ugh, I want to get the hell out of here…"

Stan and Kenny were walking down the hallway together, trying to peek into other hospital rooms to see what some of the other patients had. "Well, I'm glad that Kyle's finally gonna get better," Stan remarked, and Kenny nodded.

_"Yeah, it's about time that he let someone help him,"_ Kenny agreed. They were nearing the lobby when a voice stopped them in their tracks; it was Kyle's doctor, Dr. Lockwood, talking with Gerald and Sheila Broflovski in the lobby. Stan and Kenny paused where they stood, listening in on the conversation as best they could, as there was always a lot of outside turmoil going on in a hospital.

"…we just received Kyle's results back and I felt it best that we discuss it with you two before anyone else," Dr. Lockwood began, holding a small folder in his hands. "Since Kyle was unconscious, we were unable to perform many of the basic tests, which require vision tests, hearing tests, et cetera, so we immediately performed MRI scans and a series of x-rays.

"Both the x-rays and MRI scan came back showing the same results." He paused for a moment, sighing softly. "It seems that Kyle has developed a tumor in the lateral ventricle of his brain--"

"Oh my God!" Mrs. Broflovski exclaimed, cutting off the doctor mid-sentence. "My…my baby has _cancer_?"

The doctor frowned. "Yes, we believe so, Mrs. Broflovski. I'm terribly sorry--"

"Sorry?" Mrs. Broflovski repeated. "What in God's name do you have to be sorry for? I'm the one who didn't notice…I'm the one who…who ignored the…the signs…I…oh, Gerald!" she wailed, clinging to her husband. Mr. Broflovski held his wife, his face gone pale; he looked as though the doctor's words still had not sunk in just yet.

Stan and Kenny stood in the hallway, speechless. "Oh…oh my God, dude…no…no way. I…there's no way. After all _that_…that can't be right." His eyes suddenly felt heavy; his whole head did, in fact. This was all so wrong. There was no way that his best friend could have...

"No, he can't!" he said aloud, anger spreading across his face. "They're wrong, right Kenny?" he asked, looking desperately for someone to agree with him. "There's nothing wrong with Kyle, right?" he demanded, locking eyes with Kenny.

He and Kenny stared at each other for a moment, when the anger was suddenly erased from Stan's face in one clean swipe. His face contorted, and he fell onto Kenny's shoulder, clutching at his friend's hooded neck. Kenny--although Stan did not quite realize it at the time--hugged him back, trying to comfort both Stan and himself at the same time.

Tears slipped down Stan's face unnoticed, falling onto Kenny's orange jacket. "He'll be fine, Kenny, right?" Stan muttered, his words barely understandable. "Right…he will…won't he…?"

Kenny continued to console his friend, but felt himself unable to answer Stan's continuing question. _He'll be fine…right?_

Stan's sobbing abruptly stopped when he heard Mrs. Broflovski ask a question no one had considered: "Oh, Gerald, how will we tell Kyle?"

_To Be Continued…_


	5. Chapter Five

Disclaimer-I own nothing. The show belongs to its creators.

Author's Note-Much love and thanks to my reviewers of Chapter Four: E2K, "Spice Of Life," "Janelle," doogy, Leela's tears, Out Of Tune, yaoi-luven-freak, and Luna Seraph.

* * *

The Way It Is

By: Lamia Astaroth

* * *

When someone allows you  
to bear his burdens, you  
have found deep friendship.  
-Real Live Preacher

No one means all he says,  
and yet very few say all  
they mean, for words are  
slippery and thought is viscous  
-Henry Adams

How often is it that the  
angry man rages denial  
of what his inner self  
is telling him?  
-Frank Herbert

Anger is just a cowardly  
extension of sadness.  
It's a lot easier to be  
angry at someone than  
it is to tell them you're hurt.  
-Alanis Morisette

* * *

**CHAPTER FIVE**

"How will we tell Kyle?" Mrs. Broflovski asked her husband, tears rolling down her face. "I can't do that to him. He's been through so much already and he's too young, Gerald!" She pulled a tissue out from her purse and wiped her eyes with it, leaving black mascara ringlets beneath her eyes.

Gerald shook his head. He looked lost; his eyes did not appear to be in focus. "I-I don't know, Sheila. I don't know what we're going to say to him..." He pressed his fingers to his eyes, as though trying to keep the tears from escaping. He could not break down; he had to stay strong for his son. If he lost it...Kyle might as well.

Dr. Lockwood cleared his throat uncomfortably. "If you would like, I could explain Kyle's situation to him. Then he would understand exactly _what_ he has and how we're going to treat it."

The Broflovski's considered this in a still silence, looking into each other's eyes. "Maybe that _would_ be best," Gerald said, speaking for both him and his wife. "If either one of us knew what to say, we would, but..." He shook his head. "There's no way we can."

Dr. Lockwood nodded in agreement. "I can understand that. It's never easy for parents to give their children bad news; especially news like _this_. Would you like to be there? So that you two know what we plan on doing to treat Kyle?"

"Of _course_ we would!" Sheila exclaimed, and Dr. Lockwood recoiled as though Sheila had struck him across the face. "I'm sorry, Dr. Lockwood," she said, softly, "I'm just so _angry_ at myself. I didn't mean to yell at you--"

"Think nothing of it, Mrs. Broflovski. Doctors are often the bearers of horrible news, so we usually get more than just someone yelling at us." He shifted the portfolio from his left hand to his right, as though the conversation he was having with Sheila and Gerald was making him more than uncomfortable. "Are you ready?" he asked, obviously unsure as what he should say. _He must be new to this job,_ Sheila thought in annoyance.

Sheila and Gerald looked at each other for a moment, and then nodded. "I think we're ready," Gerald Broflovski replied. "But," he added, inhaling deeply, "I think that I should be the one to tell him."

Dr. Lockwood raised an eyebrow at the suggestion. "Are you sure, Mr. Broflovski? Because--"

"--no, I'll do it. I'm his father," he replied, nodding, as though still trying to convince himself.

"Doctor?" Sheila Broflovski began, as though in an afterthought. "Do you think Kyle will be…okay?"

"Well, Mrs. Broflovski, in the scheme of things, Kyle does have a fighting chance. The tumor is not _too_ large, so we should be able to remove it, if you feel that surgery is the way to go. Otherwise, we'll use radiation therapy…when you two decide which method you prefer, let me know."

"Before we make any decisions, Doctor, we need to talk with Kyle," Mr. Broflovski said, clearly using all of his energy to keep from breaking down. "He needs to know what's going on."

Dr. Lockwood nodded. "Of course. If you're sure you're ready, follow me down to Kyle's room."

Sheila Broflovski inhaled deeply, and her husband wrapped his arm around her shoulders. "We have to, Sheila. It's not about us being ready; it's about getting Kyle better as soon as possible," Gerald whispered to her.

"I know," she whispered in reply, wiping the remaining tears from her eyes. Regaining her stance, Sheila took Gerald's hand in hers and began to follow Dr. Lockwood down the hallway.

Sheila and Gerald stopped in their tracks at the sight of Stan and Kenny leaning against the wall, their eyes red and puffy. "Oh, boys," Sheila said. "I'm…I'm so sorry you had to…to hear it that way…"

Stan sniffed, looking up at Mrs. Broflovski with large, bloodshot eyes. "But the doctor said that he's going to be fine, right? That's what he said…"

"That's what we hope, Stanley," Mr. Broflovski replied, distress in his eyes. He sighed deeply, looking down the hall toward Kyle's room. "Now run along, Stanley; your parents are on their way to pick you up."

Stan withdrew slightly out of surprise. He had to be there for Kyle when he was given the news. What would Kyle do without him there for support? Sure, he had his parents, but that usually was not enough for a kid--a kid _needed_ his friends. "What? But…but…Kyle--"

Mr. Broflovski shook his head sternly. "No, Stan. I know that you want to help Kyle, but now is not the time. He needs time to…understand what's happening. You're more than welcome to drop by tomorrow, after he has had awhile with the doctor to decide what's going to happen."

"But…but--" Stan stuttered, fumbling for the right words.

Gerald Broflovski shook his head again, placing a (not so) comforting hand on Stan's shoulder. "I know this is tough for you, but, please, for Kyle's sake, let us handle this."

Stan opened his mouth to say that, for Kyle's sake, he _should_ stay, but, instead, turned toward the lobby and said, "Okay. Kenny, let's go. My parents are going to be here soon."

Kenny looked at Stan in disbelief. _How in the hell can he just let them tell him what his best friend needs?_ he wondered. _"Okay,"_ he replied, nonetheless, following Stan toward the lobby.

Stan sighed, rubbing at his burning eyes before pressing the "down" button on the elevator without so much as another word. Finally, Kenny demanded, _"Stan, what the fuck are we doing? You know that Kyle's parents aren't going to make him feel any better…he already seemed freaked out. And that was before he knew he…was sick."_

"I know, Kenny," Stan replied, staring at the closed elevator doors, secretly glad that Kenny had not said "cancer"; he still did not feel ready to accept it just yet. "But what can we do? If we don't listen to Kyle's parents, they may say that we can't see him again. And then _how_ would we be able to make him feel better?"

"_I guess you're right…but I still hate that they think they know so much more about his feelings than us. I mean, Kyle told _us_ he was feeling sick, not them. That says something right there--"_

"--look, Kenny, can we _not_ talk about this right now?" Stan interrupted and Kenny went silent. The elevator chimed and the doors opened, allowing the two boys to step inside. Stan pressed the first floor's button on the panel, and they stood in a piercing silence as the elevator descended.

"_So,"_ Kenny began, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, _"what are we going to tell Eric?"_

"Who cares?" Stan snapped, folding his arms over his chest. "He didn't even care enough to come and _see_ Kyle, so why should we even bother telling him? He's just an uncaring fatass who would send any of us to Hell to get a bag of Cheesy Poofs without even thinking twice about it!"

Kenny shrugged, unshaken by Stan's words. _"You and I saw him earlier--you know, when he refused to come to the hospital--and you saw it, too. He cared. He's just too fucking full of himself to let us know that. Besides, he's going to find out anyway; might as well be from us."_

Stan grunted. _Kenny's right,_ he thought. _Besides, maybe this is what it'll take for him to admit that he cares about what happens. Heh, maybe he'll even cry a little._ The image of the headstrong Eric Cartman dissolving into tears made a smile flicker across Stan's lips.

"_Dude, why are you smiling?"_ Kenny asked, his voice sounding perplexed at seeing Stan grinning during such a distressing occasion.

Stan shook his head. "Nothing," he replied, the smile fading, a blank expression taking its place. The elevator doors opened, allowing Stan and Kenny to exit the elevator. Just as they walked out, Stan saw his parents parking just in front of the entrance to the building. "They're here, Kenny," he said, glancing quickly at the hooded boy. "Let's go."

He and Kenny walked swiftly out of the hospital and arrived beside the Marsh's car before either Sharon or Randy Marsh had gotten out. They climbed into the back seat of the car just as Mr. and Mrs. Marsh had taken off their seat belts.

"Wow, boys, you got out here fast," Mrs. Marsh said, turning to look at the two of them. "When we first pulled in, we didn't even see you."

Stan shrugged his shoulders. "We were just…ready to go," he said, looking down at the floor of the car.

Mr. Marsh buckled his seat belt and re-started the car. "So, how's little Kyle doing?" Sharon Marsh asked as Randy pulled out of the Hells Pass Hospital parking lot.

Kenny glanced over at Stan, whose eyes were glued to the back of his father's seat. "He's…sick," Stan replied, not wishing to discuss his friend's health at that moment. "But I think that you should ask Mr. or Mrs. Broflovski; I think the doctor told them more than they told us," he added, hoping to end the conversation.

"Well, I'm sure he'll end up fine, honey," Mrs. Marsh said. "Kids get sick all the time. That's just the way it is."

_The way it is? That doesn't sound like a good explanation to me,_ Stan thought. _God, I hope that's not what they're telling Kyle right now.

* * *

_

Dr. Lockwood stopped just outside of Kyle's room--Room 17F--and turned back to the Broflovski parents. "Before we go in, I'd just like to tell you some of the possible reactions Kyle might have."

"Okay," Gerald replied, and Sheila nodded. _At least he's using "I" instead of "us" or "we",_ she thought.

"The first--and obvious--reaction is denial. Now, depending on your son, this denial can last hours, days, or even months. Hopefully he'll be one of those kids who accepts it right away and accepts the needed help."

"Well, Kyle's a smart boy; I'm sure he'll understand if we explain it to him," Gerald Broflovski replied, sounding as though he were defending his son. "I'm sorry," he said. "I know you're trying to help, but can we please tell Kyle so that we can get him well sooner?"

"Of course," Dr. Lockwood replied, turning back toward room 17F. He took a hold of the doorknob and turned, opening the door to Kyle's room. "Hello Kyle," he greeted, entering the room, Mr. and Mrs. Broflovski in tow.

"Hi," Kyle replied, taking a bite of food from off of a green tray that had been placed in front of him. "Hey Mom, Dad."

"Hello, sweetie," Sheila Broflovski replied, looking close to tearing up again. "How are you feeling, booby?"

"Fine," Kyle replied through a bite of lasagna. "A lot better, actually. So, when am I going home?" he asked, anxiously. _Calm down, Kyle,_ he told himself. _If you sound too eager they might keep you for observation or whatever…_

Gerald swallowed, looking over at Sheila--her hand was pressed against her face as though it would collapse if she were to let go. He sighed, walking over to the bed. He sat down on a chair--the same chair he had been sitting on when Kyle had been unconscious--and looked at his son. "Listen, Kyle--" he began, causing Kyle to pause in his eating.

"What…what is it, Dad? I do get to go home, right? That's what you said earlier…if it's a few more days, that's okay, but if I stay here for any longer, I'll go crazy." When his father did not reply, Kyle asked, softly, "Dad? Am I okay?"

Gerald Broflovski looked into his son's bewildered green eyes and instantly felt as though his eyes had gained twenty extra pounds. Water filled them, threatening to fall. He covered his face with his hand, not wanting his son to see him crying. "Kyle," he began, his voice shaking, "do you...do you know what a tumor is?" he asked, hoping he was approaching the matter gently.

Kyle's stomach began to form knots with itself. "I, uhh...yeah. It's, like, cancer...right?" he asked, clenching the soup spoon in his right hand. It was the only thing he had to keep him from completely freaking out.

Mr. Broflovski nodded, losing a battle against the tears that were trying to fall. "Yes, that's right. And this tumor is…is growing," he said, struggling for the right words. After all, how exactly do you explain something like that to a child? "The doctor took an x-ray of your brain, and it showed that you have a small tumor…"

Kyle stared at his father, dropping the spoon onto the clean covers of his bed, splattering the sheets with an orange color. _This is not happening, this is not happening, this is _not happening! His mind was repeating that sentence over and over and, try as he might, Kyle could not get himself to wake up. _Because this has to be a dream…just like last night…just a dream._

"But it's going to be okay, Kyle. Don't worry," Gerald tried to assure him. "The hospital is going to help you. Of course," he added, turning toward Dr. Lockwood, "we're going to get more x-rays done, just to make sure."

Dr. Lockwood nodded. "Like your father said, Kyle, there's no need to worry. The location of your tumor is one of the easiest to remove by surgery--"

"What?" Kyle interjected. "No! There's no way I'm having…surgery."

"But Kyle, if you don't get the tumor out, it's going to get bigger and bigger, until there's no space left, and then…your mind won't work properly," Mr. Broflovski told him.

"He's right, Gerald," Mrs. Broflovski piped in. "Surgery is very dangerous; I'm not sure if I feel comfortable with it. Doctor, you said that there was another option? Radiation therapy?"

"Yes…actually, Mr. Broflovski, radiation therapy might even be better for Kyle's tumor; it is still very small, and we might not even be able to find it during surgery," Dr. Lockwood stated.

"Wait, radiation therapy? What in God's name is _that_?" Kyle asked. _It doesn't sound any better than surgery, that's for sure_, he thought, picking the spoon up from the covers and placing it back onto the tray.

"Radiation therapy is when this special…energy is beamed at the tumor. It basically shrinks the tumor, and you do not feel a thing. You would come here each day for a short period of time and have the treatment done."

_Well, if it's a choice between _that_ and surgery…_ "That sounds a _lot_ better," he said, picking at the fuzzes on the blanket.

"I think that sounds much safer. Don't you, Gerald?" Mrs. Broflovski asked.

"Well, if the doctor thinks that's what would be best…and if you prefer it, Kyle. I guess that's what we'll do. Again, after we have a few more tests done," he added, not wanting Kyle to give up hope that, maybe, it was all just a mistake.

"Well, I've got to go and see another patient," Dr. Lockwood stated, turning toward the exit. "Kyle, if you have any questions, just ask me or one of the nurses, okay?"

"Sure," Kyle said, less than enthusiastically. He could not bring himself to look up from the blanket. He had tried to sound calm about it, but his heart was racing so quickly that it was actually beginning to hurt his chest. "Mom?" he said, softly, once the doctor had left.

"Yes, booby?" she asked, coming over to stand beside his bed.

"How did this happen?" he stammered. "I mean…why me?"

"I don't know, baby," she replied, her eyes beginning to water up again. "It's just…one of those things, you know? It just…happens sometimes."

"I don't understand! I-I just don't get it!" he cried, pounding his fists onto the tray, splattering droplets of soup onto the bedspread. "I've tried to hard to be good, to be _smart_ and…this happens! What did I do wrong, Mom?" he asked, wiping at his eyes with the back of his hand.

"You didn't do anything wrong, honey," she replied, leaning down to embrace Kyle tightly. Her husband quickly joined the family embrace.

"Mom? Dad?" Kyle asked, once the embrace had ended. "Where's Stan and Kenny? And Ike?"

"Stan and Kenny had to go home--Stan's parents picked them up a little while ago. And Ike is down in the daycare center, playing with some other children," Mr. Broflovski explained.

"No, I mean…do they know?"

"Yes, son…Stan and Kenny overheard our discussion with the doctor earlier. They looked pretty upset by it. Stan really wanted to be here for you, but I thought it would be best if he came to visit after…you know, all this."

"Oh…" _Well, you thought wrong, Dad,_ Kyle thought, looking back down at the sheets. _I really, really wish my friends were here right now.

* * *

_

Stan and Kenny arrived back at the Marsh house right about the time Mr. and Mrs. Broflovski told Kyle about his illness. They climbed out of the car and immediately began walking down the street to Cartman's house.

"Boys, where are you going?" Mrs. Marsh called after them from the stairs leading to the front door.

"We're going to Cartman's!" Stan called back. "It's only, like, eleven in the morning, right?"

"Okay, but be home by five…all right, Stan?"

"All right, all right!" Stan replied, rolling his eyes at his mother's nagging. "Kenny, I've gotta tell you, you have way too much faith in Cartman to actually expect him to give a shit about this."

Kenny shrugged. _"You heard him before; he's Kyle's friend. He has as much right to know as we do."_ Kenny paused for a moment, considering this. _"Well, maybe as much as _me_, not you…you have more right than either of us."_

"That's bullshit," Stan disagreed, but, on the inside, he agreed completely with Kenny's statement: _I _am_ his best friend…I didn't see either Cartman _or_ Kenny caring at all when Kyle nearly died from that kidney problem._

As the two boys strolled down the sidewalk, Stan could not help but wonder if Kyle had found out about his disease yet and, if he had, how he was taking it. _After school tomorrow, _he thought,_ I'm going straight to the hospital. I don't care what anyone says, that's what's happening._

Stan stuffed his hands into his pockets, kicking at a patch of snow on the walkway. None of it seemed fair--everything was happening to Kyle. What had he done to deserve all of these health problems? He was always such a good friend, always a dedicated son and brother--well, almost always, but no one's perfect. But it appeared that someone up there seemed to enjoy using Kyle as a target in some stupid game.

It was not fair; then again, life never was, was it? It's always the good, loyal people who have to suffer; those assholes that go around killing people usually never get sick. After all, when was the last time you heard on the news, _"Vicious Killer Diagnosed With Cancer"_? Bottom line, you never did.

Cartman's house came into view and Stan suddenly had an urge to turn around and walk back to his own house. He knew that Cartman was going to say something against Kyle after they told him, and, even if Cartman was going to do it to simply cover up his true feelings, Stan knew that he would not be able to take it.

He would probably end up kicking Cartman in the balls or even beating him senseless, if it came to that. All the same, he continued walking toward Cartman's house, Kenny still walking directly beside him.

He approached the Cartman residence and walked up the footpath to the front door. Kenny reached up and rang the doorbell. Even from outside, they could hear Cartman's voice shouting, "Mom, someone's at the door!" followed by, "Coming, Hun."

Mrs. Cartman opened the front door. "Oh, hello boys," she greeted and, for a moment, Stan hated her sweet, happy voice; he hated that she could be so happy when something so bad was happening. _She doesn't know_, he tried to tell himself, but that did not keep the disgust from being there.

"Hi Mrs. Cartman, is Cartman here?" Stan asked, and she nodded, stepping backwards to allow them to come inside.

"Eric!" she called. "Your little friends are here!" As Kenny and Stan made their way toward the television room (where they naturally assumed Cartman would be), they could hear Cartman groaning in aggravation.

"Hey Cartman," Stan said when they had entered the room. Cartman was, as he usually was, sitting on his couch, a bag of Cheesy Poofs clutched in his hands, staring at an episode of "Terrance and Philip."

"Hey, what's going on, you guys?" he asked, shoveling a handful of cheesy poofs into his mouth.

"We were just at the hospital with Kyle, Cartman," Stan explained. "He's--"

"Oh, oh, let me guess. He's fine. Just like I told you guys. But would you listen? No, of course not. You know, you'd think, after a while, you'd just stop being such goddamn _pussies_. You've got to _learn_. Jews are crafty; they'll do anything to try and fool you."

Stan's eyes narrowed and he took a threatening step toward Cartman. Kenny held out his arm, stopping Stan before he could get too far. _"No, Eric,"_ Kenny said, lowering his arm. _"Now why don't you just shut the fuck up, and listen, for once?"_

Stan quickly gave Kenny a grateful look, and then turned his attention back to Cartman. "Listen, fatass, this is serious, okay?" Stan paused for a moment, gathered his energy, and continued: "Kyle's sick. _Really_ sick. Kenny and I overheard the doctor talking to his parents. He's got cancer, Cartman." Tears sprung to Stan's eyes, but he quickly wiped them away.

"The doctor said he has a brain tumor," Stan continued. "I don't know a lot about cancer, but I do know that a lot of people die from cancer." More tears appeared, slipping out of the corners of his eyes. "He _is_ sick, Cartman…and…and he might…get worse. You know, he might...die."

Cartman stared at Stan for a moment. "Oh, I get it!" he said, after a moment of silence. "You guys are trying to make me feel bad. Well, it didn't work, assholes! I know you're just trying to fool me--"

"Goddammit, Cartman, we're _not_ joking! This is serious! I know you don't care if Kyle dies or not, but we thought, since you're his…since you know him, you should know about it."

Cartman gave Stan an angry look and hopped off of the couch. "Listen dickhead," he said, thrusting his index finger into Stan's chest, "it's like I already told you: Kyle is not sick. I wish that you would stop trying to tell me shit that isn't true!" He rolled his eyes, lowered his hand, and murmured, "Damn fucking Jews, always trying to infect us clean people with their lies--"

_Thwack!_ Before Cartman could even react, Stan had punched him clear in the jaw. Cartman's hand flew up to his face, caressing the now-wounded spot. He stared at Stan, shocked.

Stan stared back at Cartman, fury in his eyes. "Dammit Cartman, I just wish, for once, you would actually be honest about how you're feeling, instead of just hiding behind Jewish jokes. And if you say anything else about Kyle, I swear to God, I will beat the fucking _shit_ out of you!"

Stan turned on his heel and walked out of the Cartman house without another word. Cartman looked over at Kenny. Kenny flashed Cartman a pissed-off look that Cartman could clearly see, even in spite of the coat.

_"He's right, Eric,"_ Kenny said, _"punch and all. If you weren't so fucking arrogant, you might actually be able to say that you care about what happens to Kyle, and that you're worried."_ Kenny took a few steps toward the door, paused, and then turned back to Cartman.

"_And if you _do_ say anything else about Kyle, I promise that I'll be there cheering for Stan when he's beating the shit out of you."_ He turned and walked heatedly out of the Cartman house, leaving Eric Cartman standing there, still holding his jaw, still in shock.

"That pussy actually _hit_ me," he told the room, lowering his hand from his face. "Maybe…maybe Kyle really _is_ sick. Maybe he really does have…cancer…"

"Who has cancer, sweetie?" Mrs. Cartman asked, entering the room with a tray full of food.

Cartman stared up at his mother for a second. "…Kyle," he replied, sitting back down on the couch. "Kyle has cancer."

"Oh my!" Mrs. Cartman exclaimed. "The poor boy. You should go visit him, Eric. It might make him feel better--"

"No! I am _not_ visiting Kyle in the hospital! He's going to be fine, anyway, so why should I?" he snapped, picking up his bag of Cheesy Poofs.

Mrs. Cartman frowned. "Why, Eric, you don't know that…what if he's really--"

"Mom!" Cartman interrupted. "I just _can't_, okay?" he whined, clutching the Cheesy Poof's bag so tightly that it began to crumble loudly beneath his fingers.

Mrs. Cartman smiled knowingly. "All right, honey," she agreed, placing the tray of food down beside her son. "At least tell Stan to give Kyle a 'Get Well' from you."

"Yeah, whatever, Mom," he mumbled under his breath. He watched as his mother left the room, then returned his gaze to the television. For some reason, he found that he was unable to focus his attention on what was happening; his mind kept switching to other places.

_I bet he's just faking,_ he thought. _Just trying to fool me, so that he can go, "Ha, ha, ha! I got you, I got you!" Well, I'm not going to let him…he thinks he's so smart._ He reached into the bag of chips, but, when he brought his hand back out, it was empty.

_What if he's _not_ faking? After all, Stan--the biggest wuss in school--punched me. He must've been really pissed. What if this is all real? What if Kyle really does have brain cancer? That's really bad, right? What if he _does_...die?_

He scoffed, shaking his head. _No, that won't happen. Kids don't just _die_. He's only nine, anyway. No, he won't die, he won't die..._

After a while, that one sentence became a rhythmic chanting in his head. It almost seemed, even to him, that he was trying to convince himself. That, even in spite of himself, he was scared.

_To Be Continued..._


	6. Chapter Six

Disclaimer-I own nothing. The show belongs to its creators.

Author's Note-Thanks to all who were kind enough to review: Faery Goddess, E2K, Leela's Tears, Spice of Life, Chels-Dawg, doogy, Brat Child2, and Out Of Tune.

Unfortunately, I have been having some serious computer problems. To be frank, my computer will not start. Period. So, I have resorted to using my father's old laptop (which is a '97 Compaq...ugh...), which does not have a spell check, so I apologize beforehand for any possible spelling errors.

* * *

The Way It Is

By: Lamia Astaroth

* * *

Hope is the thing with feathers  
That perches in the soul,  
And sings the tune without the words,  
And never stops at all,  
And sweetest in the gale is heard;  
And sore must be the storm  
That could abash the little bird  
That kept so many warm.  
I've heard it in the chillest land,  
And on the strangest sea;  
Yet, never, in extremity,  
It asked a crumb of me.  
-Emily Dickinson "Hope is the thing with feathers"

Staring at these four walls again  
I'll try to think about the last time  
I had a good time, everyone's got  
Somewhere to go, and they're gonna  
Leave me here on my own and  
Here it goes. I'm just a kid and  
Life is a nightmare. I'm just a kid  
I know that it's not fair. Nobody  
cares 'cause I'm alone and the  
world is having more fun than me.  
What the hell is wrong with me?  
-Simple Plan "I'm Just a Kid"

* * *

**CHAPTER SIX **

Kyle Broflovski lay in the still silence of his room; a silence that was frequently interrupted by the electric beeping of the heart monitor. The heart monitor--God, what an annoying invention _that_ was. It was Kyle's only proof that he was still alive, and he listened to the beeping nervously, as though, at any given second, his ears would be filled with a long, high-pitched single bleep, and then _bam_! Life was over, he was gone.

The continuous beeping did not stop, however, but it was enough to worry him. He reached over to his bedside table and picked up a glass of water--"Perfectly clean, filtered water," his nurse had told him, as though dirty water would somehow make his situation worse than it already was.

_Absolutely nothing could make this worse,_ he thought. He had not said that to the nurse, of course, but had rather accepted the water with a general politeness. He guessed that the nurse did not get polite kids in very often, because he later overheard her telling his father what a "sweetheart" he was.

Kyle sipped from the glass, swallowed, and then set the glass back down on the table. _Stan was right_, he thought, shifting around uncomfortably beneath the covers. _I should've told my parents right away, when I first started feeling sick. Maybe if I had, I wouldn't have can…can… _

He shuddered; he could not even bring himself to _think_ the word without either, one, wanting to throw up, or, two, completely freaking out.

He felt such a severe amount of guilt, fear, and embarrassment--caused mainly by the whole falling asleep on the park bench thing, which he still, for the life of him (_Ooh, bad analogy,_ he warned himself), could not remember happening--that a small part of him wished that he could find someone who would just pull his plug and end it all, before it got any worse.

Of course, he knew that, at that present time, he did not exactly _have_ a plug to pull; what he had was a growth in his brain; turning off the machines would not exactly kill him.

He shuddered again, more rigorously this time, his hand flying up to his hatless head. The doctor had apparently removed the hat when Kyle had first arrived, and it was now sitting atop a chair on the opposite side of the room from where Kyle was lying.

His fingers rubbed at the spot where the doctor had explained--using many x-rays and pictures--his tumor was. For a split second, he was sure he could feel it…and then he remembered that that was impossible; the tumor was nowhere near the surface, and was still relatively small. Letting out a small sigh, he dropped his hand back down to the clean hospital sheets.

He let his head flop down on the pillow and stared up at the blank white ceiling, moaning inwardly. "Oh my God, why is this happening?" he asked the ceiling in a soft, slurring gasp. He covered his face with his hands, letting out an exasperated grunt. _This just isn't fair!_ he thought, inhaling. He could smell the faint scent of rust on his hands and wondered if it had come from the park bench.

"Hello Kyle," a cheerful voice greeted, breaking through the depressive thoughts that Kyle had been immersed in. Kyle looked up and was met with the dark brown eyes of his nurse, Margaret--eyes that were surrounded by tired wrinkles. _Probably from smoking, _Kyle had thought when he had first met Margaret. _She looks like a smoker._

And she did; no older than thirty five, Margaret's face was already covered by deep creases. Trying to conceal them, Margaret applied a cover-up to her face once every hour, Kyle assumed. _Kind of ironic, a nurse being a smoker_, Kyle thought in amusement.

Margaret walked up to Kyle's bedside, her fingers wrapped around a small plastic cup. "I have two aspirin here for you," she stated, handing the cup to Kyle. Off of Kyle's confused look, she added: "Just in case you get any headaches."

"Oh...okay," Kyle replied, his voice low. He again picked up his water glass and, one at a time, swallowed the tiny capsules. "Thanks," he murmured, handing the cup back to Margaret, not looking her directly in the eye.

"Sure honey," she replied, and Kyle could not help but cock an eyebrow at her. He wondered if Margaret was trying extra hard to be chummy with him, what with the "honeys," "sweethearts," and other numerous nicknames she had called him in his time at the hospital. _It's pretty messed up_, Kyle thought to himself as he placed the water glass back on the bedside table. _But hey, at least she's not a bitch, right? I could've been stuck with one of those "I'll only respond if you're dying" nurses._

"Is there anything else you want?" she asked, as though Kyle had asked to have the aspirin.

_Yeah. My friends. My family. My _life_, for God's sake. Got any of that?_ Of course, Kyle did not say any of these things to her, but simply shrugged. "No, thanks," he said, picking at the fuzzes on his comforter. They were white, just like all of the walls, the floors, and the ceilings of the hospital. He let go of the fuzzes and watched with mild interest as they floated away and hid within the camouflage of the walls.

"Okee-dokee," Margaret replied, happily, and Kyle rolled his eyes as she turned her back to him. How could she possibly be so cheerful when she was watching over someone--a child, nonetheless--who had cancer? _She's probably trying to lift up my spirits_, Kyle thought. _Well, hate to break it to her, but...not working._

Kyle sighed, and then went back to picking the excess fuzzes from the blanket. _God, I wish Stan and Kenny were still here. It'd give me someone to talk to. Hell, I wouldn't even mind if Cartman were here. Maybe if he'd piss me off, I'd have something else to think about. I wonder if Stan and Kenny have told him about me yet. Well, everyone's going to find out tomorrow when I'm not at school._

Kyle leaned forward, looking at the bedside table once again, this time at the small digital clock--which was, of course, white. It was nearly five in the afternoon; everyone was probably at home eating dinner or cooking dinner or watching television--which Kyle had the option of doing, but it was not the same when he was alone--and, in essence, living their lives. His body ached to leave this room, leave this hospital, and run outside in the fresh air; the hospital air was sickening--a mix of latex gloves, medicine, and tears. And death. Lots and lots of death.

For amusement, when he was not watching television, Kyle resorted to staring at the digital clock beside his bed, watching as the minutes slowly creaked by. How could time move so slowly? It was as though time was moving in slow motion just for him. There were even moments where Kyle was sure that time had completely frozen, until the sudden changing of the minute digit proved his paranoia wrong.

Tomorrow was the day of his "Second opinion" testing. One of those tests that were designed to give hopeless cases a small string of hope so that they would not go completely crazy before there was time for treatment.

His other doctor--not Dr. Lockwood, but some really old guy named Dr. Roland, or something like that--had come in at exactly two fifteen that afternoon--Kyle knew that for a fact; he had been playing "Watch the Clock" at that time--and explained what they were going to do. Basically, it was the same procedure as the first time, except, this time, Kyle was expected to be conscious for it.

"Kyle?" Another voice rang through his ears, causing the red-headed boy to look toward the door, where his parents, and a squirming Ike, were entering his room. "How are you feeling, son?" Mr. Broflovski asked, walking over and patting Kyle's shoulder in a fatherly way.

"Ehh," Kyle replied, giving his father a "so-so" hand gesture. _I can't say "shitty,"_ he told himself. _Not because they'd get mad at me for cursing, but because they don't want to hear that I'm not doing well._

"Well, don't get too used to this place, Kyle. Give it a week or so, and you'll be back at home, watching TV with your little friends, just like before," Mrs. Broflovski said with a sad little smile.

_Right, Mom,_ Kyle thought, but smiled back at her, nonetheless. "How're you doing, Ike?" he asked, looking down at his little brother.

Ike stared back into Kyle's green eyes, and Kyle could sense that, as young as he was, his brother could understand what was happening; why Kyle was at the hospital. Ike opened his mouth and began to respond with a series of incoherent babbles, followed by a crystal clear, "...miss you."

The smile was still frozen on Kyle face, and he reached down and ruffled his brother's hair gently. "Don't worry about me, Ike. Mom and Dad say I'm going to be okay."

"'Kay," Ike replied, but his eyes were still shining with a sense of worry, a sense of doubt. Ike reached up and took his mother's hand in a vice-like grip, staring at the white hospital floor.

Mr. Broflovski chuckled nervously. "Yeah, poor kid. You've only been here a few hours and he's already asked about a hundred times where you are, when you're coming home, why you're here..." He chuckled again, thought better of it, and quickly turned the chuckle into a cough. "He's smart for such a young boy."

_"You're a smart boy,"_ his father's voice told him in his mind. Kyle nodded. "Yeah,"he replied, although he had barely heard his father's statement about Ike over his loud, ongoing thoughts. He pushed his thoughts aside and tried his hardest to focus on his father's words.

"...ready for tomorrow?" Kyle caught the final words of his father's question, and it was all that he needed. His father wanted to know if he was ready for the "Second opinion" test the next day.

Pursing his lips, Kyle considered his father's question. The tests the next day were going to be the "final thing." While it could end up having the best news he would ever hear in his life, it could also end up being his breaking point. Kyle looked up at his father and replied, honestly, "No."

* * *

"So, Kyle, your mother got some news about Kyle from Mrs. Broflovski this afternoon," Randy Marsh stated, as he began to cut his steak. The Marsh's were in the middle of their family dinner, and, before Mr. Marsh's earlier statement, there had been nothing but silence over the four members of the Marsh family.

Sharon Marsh cleared her throat in a way that told her husband that she wished to be the one to inform Stan of the information. "Yes. Stan, honey, it seems that Kyle...well, Kyle has--"

"Oh, God, I _know_!" Stan spat, slamming his fork down on the table. "Kyle has cancer. I overheard the doctor telling his mom and dad," he added, off of his parents' bewildered looks. "It's not fair! Why'd this have to happen?" he demanded, angrily, crossing his arms so tightly over his chest that it looked as though he was embracing himself.

"Oh, Stan, I'm sorry that you had to find out that way, but Mrs. Broflovski told me on the phone that, tomorrow, Kyle is going to have another series of tests, just to make sure that he _does_ have...that he is sick," Sharon quickly rearranged her words, seeing how obviously flustered her son was. "Doctors make mistakes all the time."

Stan looked at his mother, a small tint of hope shining in his blue eyes. "Yeah, maybe they _were_ wrong. Maybe...maybe Kyle is...is okay. I can visit him tomorrow after school, right? At the hospital? I don't want him to be alone."

Mr. and Mrs. Marsh nodded simultaneously. "Of course you can visit him after school, son," Mr. Marsh replied, wiping his mouth with a napkin. "But, you know, Kyle won't be alone; he has his family there. You don't have to worry about _that_."

Stan shrugged. "I guess...but, it's just, Kyle's going to need a friend there. Sometimes parents aren't good enough, you know? Especially if the news _is_ bad; he's going to need a friend there."

Sharon and Randy Marsh smiled kindly at their son and gave him a nod in agreement. "You're right there, Stan," Sharon said. "Maybe you can cheer him up a bit. Shelia told me that Kyle seems pretty upset by it all; but she said he's doing a good job of trying to hide it, too."

_Well, of course he's upset,_ Stan thought, picking at his food with a lack of interest in actually eating it. _It's not exactly news that makes you want to smile and go, "Oh, well, that's interesting." _He fought off the urge to roll his eyes and make that sarcastic remark to his mother. "Mom," he said, placing his fork down again. "I'm kind of tired; can I go to bed?"

"Of course, sweetie," she replied, glancing at her watch. "Why, Stan! It's only eight thirty, are you sure?"

Stan nodded. "Yeah. G'night," he said, standing up from the kitchen table. As he walked out of the kitchen and up the stairs, he noticed that Shelly had not tried to beat up on him at all that night. Maybe it was her way of showing that she felt bad about Kyle. The thought made him smile; his sister _did _have human feelings. _What a discovery!_ he thought, smiling even wider.

He opened the door to his room and walked inside. Without even thinking about it, he pushed the door shut behind him and walked over to his bed. Flopping down on his stomach on his bed, Stan buried his face in his pillow in a desperate attempt to block out everything. The pillow felt cool, and smelled of a pure cleanliness; an indescribable smell, to say the least.

As he settled into a complete sense of consciousness, Stan felt his stomach vibrate. Perhaps he should have eaten some of his dinner, but he could not bring himself to get up from the bed and leave the safe haven of his bedroom. He did not want to hear his parents go on and on about Kyle--how "_horrible,_ absolutely _horrible_ it was." Stan had accidentally overheard his mother telling his father about Kyle after Mrs. Broflovski had called. _I've really had a knack for overhearing things like that lately,_ Stan thought, sighing into his pillow.

He jumped slightly at the sound of his phone ringing. He groaned in exasperation, reaching over and picking up the phone from beside his bed. He lifted his head and muttered a barely audible, "Hello?" into the receiver.

"Stan?" a high-pitched voice said, and Stan instantly shifted around on his bed so that he was sitting upright.

"Hi Wendy. Yeah, it's me," Stan replied, trying his hardest to sound as normal as possible. "How are you?"

"That's what I was going to ask you, Stan," Wendy replied, and Stan furrowed his eyebrows. Had Wendy found out about Kyle? How was that even possible? "I ran into Kenny about an hour ago at Stark's Pond," she said, answering Stan's unspoken question, "and he told me all about Kyle. Oh, Stan, I feel so bad...are you okay?"

_She feels bad?_ Stan asked himself. _Why? She never seemed to really like Kyle. Maybe she just feels bad for me. _"I'm...I'm..." Stan stammered, struggling with Wendy's question. In all honesty, he had never truly given himself a chance to see how exactly he felt. "...I don't know. It...it hurts," he replied, voicing his emotions as best he could.

There was silence on the other line. Stan momentarily wondered if Wendy had hung up on him; but no, he could hear her breathing softly into the receiver. "...I'm sorry," she said, finally, as though she (for once in her life) had no idea of what to say. "The...the next time you see Kyle, tell him...tell him to get well for me."

Stan swallowed the lump that had formed in his throat, and found that he too was at a loss for words. "I will...I think I'm going to see him tomorrow, after school--"

"Oh--"

The sound of Wendy's one short, curt word cut him off in mid-sentence. He paused. "What's wrong?" he asked.

"Oh, it's...it's nothing," she began, her voice about two levels softer. "It's just that we...had plans tomorrow..." She trailed off. "No, you should go and see Kyle. He needs you more than...than I do."

"Uhh..." _Damn it!_ Stan shouted in his mind. _I totally forgot about that. I can't just not see Kyle; like I told my parents, and what Wendy just told me: he needs me. But I can't ignore my girlfriend, either. I like her so much, and I don't want to lose her. Again._ "Well, maybe....maybe we can go out right after school and I'll go and visit Kyle right after." Stan heard the words trail off of his tongue and immediately felt like the worst friend ever. _Your best friend might have cancer and you're _still_ ditching him!_ his mind scolded him.

"Are...are you sure, Stan? Because it's okay--" Wendy attempted to sound unsure, but her voice held such joy in seeing Stan that all doubt that had been in her voice evanished.

_You can't blow _her_ off either, Stan. You probably made tomorrow's plans with her so long ago; she'd hate you,_ another part of his mind told him. "Yeah, I'm sure," Stan replied, his voice wavering. "But," he added, not wanting to mar his best friend, "only for, like, an hour. I really need to get to the hospital."

"Of course. That's okay, Stan," Wendy replied, the happiness in her voice nearly overwhelming. "I'll see you tomorrow at school, okay?" she asked.

"Sure," Stan muttered in response, rubbing at his eyes. "'Bye."

"'Bye." He heard the _click_ as Wendy hung up the telephone, and he did the same. He sat on the edge of his bed, unmoving, for what felt like an eternity, staring at nothing. He could still hear Wendy's elated voice pulsating throughout his mind and, without any control of his own, he thought, _She _is_ a bitch.

* * *

_

Night was beginning to fall; Kyle could see the sun sinking slowly through his window. He wanted desperately to go to sleep, but, not only were the remains of the sun shining directly into his eyes (he would have called in Margaret to close the blinds, but he simply felt too tired), there were far too many noises from different rooms leaking into his own room. Sometimes he could hear the sounds so well that it sounded as though the events were occurring right next to him.

He could hear people crying, others calling their nurses to straighten their pillows, get them food or water, or whatever else they might need. The crying was the worst, because there were never wails of happiness. It was always a family or friends of a patient, crying over a loss. Or it was the patient himself, crying because they have no chance--Kyle assumed that, given a few days, he was going to be that sound that flittered down the hallways, and other patients would hear him, and they would think, _"I'll never be able to fall asleep with that crying."_

He bit the inside of his cheek, fighting the overpowering urge to cry, mainly from embarrassment that someone would hear him. Which they would, undoubtedly.

After a few minutes, the last remains of the sun melted from view, and Kyle's room was nearly pitch dark, with the exception of the light that leaked in from the cracks on the door. Kyle closed his eyes; they had been open for so long that his eyes actually burned when he closed them. But not a painful burning; a pleasant burning.

Kyle's eyes snapped open at the sound of murmuring directly outside of his door. He held his breath, trying to hear the conversation. "...think that Gordon would be okay here," Kyle heard Dr. Lockwood say to someone. "There's a young boy already here: Kyle Broflovski. He's got the same diagnosis as Gordon, so it might actually be best if they're roomed together. Someone to talk to."

"Okay, that should be fine," a voice Kyle did not recognize replied. The voice, a voice of an older woman--a mother, possibly--sounded distressed, even weepy. Kyle sat upright as he heard the doorknob being turned.

Dr. Lockwood opened the door to Kyle's room, leaned inside, and flicked on the lights. Kyle winced under the sudden change in lighting, blinking quickly. "Sorry, Kyle," Dr. Lockwood apologized. "We've got a patient in, and we need him to room with you."

Before Kyle could agree or disagree, Dr. Lockwood had disappeared out into the hallway again. This gave Kyle a chance to see the owner of the voice that Dr. Lockwood had been talking with. It was a middle-aged woman, as he had suspected. Her eyes were outlined with red and she had a tissue held tightly in her hands.

"Okay, bring him in here," Dr. Lockwood directed, appearing back in Kyle's room. He was closely followed by two nurses--a man and a woman--wheeling a gurney. They wheeled the gurney behind the white curtain that cut off Kyle's view of the room beside him. The curtain was snapped back by one of the nurses and Kyle was able to get a good look of who was on the gurney.

It was a boy, only a few years older than him, at the most, and it looked like he was in bad shape; he was terribly pale and he looked as though he weighed about ninety pounds. Kyle remembered what the doctor had said about this boy having the same diagnosis as him, and instantly looked away.

"Kyle," Dr. Lockwood said, causing Kyle to look back over at the bed beside his, "this is Gordon Lanni, Gordon, this is Kyle Broflovski. I wish I could stay longer, but it's a very busy night tonight, not to mention your mother needs me to talk to her," he added, addressing Gordon. With that, he quickly left the room, the two nurses trailing behind him.

Kyle swallowed, looked over at Gordon, and said, weakly, "Hi."

Gordon locked eyes with Kyle--his eyes were a deep, deep brown, nearly black--and replied, "Hey...so, I hear you've got the same diagnosis as me. Brain tumor, right?"

"Uhh, yeah. I just found out today, so--"

"That sucks. I found out about three years ago. They kept sayin', 'Don't worry, Gord, you're gettin' better,' but that was just a load of horse shit. I've only gone from bad to worse. Shows what doctors know," he added, under his breath.

Kyle stared at the kid for a moment. "So, how old are you?" he asked, unsure of why he was so curious.

"Thirteen," Gordon replied instantly, as though he had been expecting the question. "I've been back and forth from my house and the hospital. I'm here tonight because the headaches have gotten so bad that I can't even read or listen to music without wanting to tear my eyes out just to make the pain stop."

Kyle frowned. Was that what was in plan for him? Coming to and from the hospital at the blink of an eye? He shuddered, hoped that Gordon had not noticed, and turned his gaze toward the door.

"Maybe you'll get lucky, though," Gordon said, and Kyle instantly wondered if he had been talking all along. "Maybe you'll get rid of the tumor and you won't ever have to worry about it again." He coughed, then sniffed, wiping at his nose. "Maybe you'll get better."

Kyle did not reply, because he could tell that Gordon did not expect an answer. He snuggled deep into the bed, turned on his side facing away from Gordon. _"Maybe you'll get better."_ Kyle snapped his eyes shut and, quicker than he would have ever believed, slipped into a deep state of sleep.

_To Be Continued..._


End file.
